Heroes of Evangelion: An Iron Will
by Krahae
Summary: An NGE – Iron Man story. When it finally looks like Shinji can begin atoning for NERV's mistakes, he's again thrust into the fray, an unwilling hero against an enemy with a familiar face, and his own tools at their fingertips. Some MGS elements. AU.
1. Chapter 1

**Heroes of Evangelion**

**An Iron Will**

I O I

"I'm sorry, sir. There's nothing else we can do."

Shinji nodded slowly, as the third specialist that week gave him the same news. The woman went to the door and the usual small debacle that was Section-2 debriefing her. Anonymity was a luxury he didn't have, but the same net that had once held him, he found, could hold information, if used properly. He didn't ascribe to the methods of his father, but the intimidating legacy of that branch of his company still carried weight.

Dying. It wasn't an easy thing to swallow, but he'd spent the better part of his recent life dealing with news that as his quirky girlfriend said, 'sucked'. Mana always managed to put a happy spin on things, he recalled fondly, sliding the black uniform's zipper back up. A simple thing, it too was a legacy of his father. It'd taken him a while to not see the man when he looked in the mirror, wearing it. It was a hard thing to think forward about, be positive over, but he managed.

Being told you had six months to live was hard to put a positive spin on, he had to admit. Not nearly as easy as making up for a man's lifetime of sins and errors.

The first hint something was wrong came a few years, five to be precise, after the madness that was Third Impact. Naturally, he'd been more concerned with other things. Rebuilding NERV in the wake of his father's death. Dealing with insanity that was the Human Instrumentality Project, after the UN shut down what they could root out of SEELE, or tried to. Wading through the grief of losing his best friend Rei, and then muddling his way to happiness with Mana. It had been busy times, good times. Work had kept his mind from recoiling down into darkness after what had happened, and the company that Mana offered did wonders for his sense of self.

Sufficed to say, a few chest pains, some odd dizziness here and there hadn't been a priority.

"How am I going to tell her," he wondered, staring out over the parking lot of the clinic as Section-2's drivers and his own guard moved to see him safely to the GeoFront.

The trip back was a good time, he figured, to look back and see what led him to this place. Stifling a sardonic laugh, he poured a glass of bourbon, and watched the ice melt slowly into the amber liquid. He smiled mirthlessly. "Here's to things, that never change," he toasted the driver, and tossed back the drink, falling into a reverie.

I O I

Another mouthful of the amber liquid, and Shinji knew he's be sick. "Damnit, the recycler is down again," he informed the new lead of Project E, Maya Ibuki, as they continued to run tests against the new entry plug mechanics. Shinji hadn't thought that after Third Impact, much would remain of NERV, but to his surprise, and young naivety, his father had made quite a few arrangements.

NERV as fate would have it, was a private organization, funded and sanctioned by the UN but not directly controlled by them. The why of this became clear as time went on, and Shinji learned more of what the monster that was NERV really was. Accountability.

The one thing that always seemed at the center of such things, be they full military institutions, para-military bodies like NERV, or even contract mercenary groups. The UN didn't want the reins, because if it came back that NERV was their hound, they'd be held responsible. It seemed the only person who did want that role, also happened to have drastically different aims for what it would become, than what he'd been tasked to.

Organized as it had been, what material and property it had jurisdiction over, fell under the domain of personal wealth. This seemed utterly improbable to Shinji, as he read over the data provided by Kozo Fuyutsuki, soon after his father's death, but if Gendo Ikari had been anything, it was a meticulous planner. Less the doting parent and more the scheming mastermind, the Commander of NERV had secured such things from the UN via his contacts in SEELE, to assure his singular dominion over all things Evangelion. That was, after all, his entire motivation for establishing the corporation. If he dominated and controlled Project E, and therefore NERV, then his ultimate goal was mere child's play to achieve.

Children, ironically, had played a critical role in his downfall. The man didn't even leave a will, but because of Shinji's biology, the man he'd never thought of as a true father had been his ultimate benefactor. "Try to adjust the filters again, I think the carbon nanoweave is just too porous."

"Right, Boss."

After the UN tribunal, the monumental task of dismantling a war machine that was an entire city and then nearly a dozen international offices, branches and subsidiaries had become the focus of nearly a year's worth of debate, but the initial gravity of things was immediate to see. NERV was too tied up in the global economy to shut down. Post Third Impact society was already a steaming mass of madness, with the world barely recovering from the potential of annihilation, compounded with the knowledge that there was something, mysterious and terrible, that had just barely avoided happening.

Or had happened, but been reversed by one Child's iron will.

Economically speaking, taking down Tokyo-3 would bankrupt the entire Hakone area. Not to mention, those people housed there, and living inside the very heart of the corporation would then be dislocated. The same scene occurred globally. NERV, like it's name suggested, had become central to too many things.

"Aoba, reroute the flow systems from the Lake, and get me a fresh feed," the order instantly obeyed, Shinji tried to stifle his ever-present sickness at the thought of where the LCL was coming from, what the source had been, and even now, what they were doing. "Also, what's the status of the L2 project, I've not had time to hit the office yet."

Maya leaned forward and queued her microphone, "I'll get Mana on the line."

"Thanks."

In time, the Tribunal that the UN set up had placed Kozo under arrest, and most of the lead developers and planners for Project E worldwide were also in similar boats. Those people too close to the Instrumentality project and it's goals for humanity, could not be redeemed, and even Shinji had to admit, speaking with the old man, he did have a solid hand in things. The MP Eva teams were as a lot imprisoned, but that wasn't enough. Inquiries were performed, and more trials, NERV the shining star in a new Salem Witch Hunt. Things were looking dire, for everyone, as the world wanted a scapegoat, needed someone to blame, and there was nothing more unifying than a common enemy. That had stopped abruptly when Shinji, quietly working with the remaining scientists, friends and companions from the Tokyo-3 division, had come up with some startling facts.

Shinji cycled the LCL in his plug manually, toggling the system from the modified control wings in his deck. "Alright, lets try the recycler again. Maya, does it look alright on your end?"

"Green here, Boss."

"... I hate it when you call me that, by the way."

"I know, Boss." He could hear the bridge staff twittering in their seats.

Sighing, Shinji again cursed the day he got that postcard. And thanked heaven for it. "Begin the test."

What they'd found, set the medical and scientific communities on their ear. The genetic advances of the Nephilim Project, Rei's birthright, had some astounding side benefits. Her nature, and how she'd come to be were that project's legacy, the combination of Lilith-born genetic material and human had been a milestone in the fields of not only molecular bioengineering but also genetics. The possibilities that the project pioneered branched and spread out, potentially touching every aspect of human medicine. Genetic tagging and earmarking of all degenerative conditions. Scanning for and prevention of long-term, ribonucleic faults. The short term results showed a therapy, theoretically, easily obtained and manufactured, that could cure or prevent 25 percent of modern congenital diseases, and cancers.

The trials against NERV screeched to a halt, almost overnight.

Project E had been reinstated, with those that passed the Tribunal's litmus tests at it's head, with a watchdog group ordained by the JSDF locally, and the UN internationally, to overlook the progress and allocation of funds. NERV had taken that first real step, in saving human lives. Shinji, modest as always, had attributed the success to Rei.

"She was the inspiration of the Nephilim Project. A woman, born of the hope for peace, flawed by the hand of man. Her origins, though ignoble, lead her to the life of a hero. She will always, always stand as our guiding light. Our guardian angel. Let her sacrifice, a life made empty and hollow by human callousness, but driven by a heart that held nothing but love, stand as a beacon to us all." The press conference at which Shinji had addressed the ethics of using the research used to create Rei, for his new NERV idea, had spawned that impromptu epitaph for the blue-haired girl. That speech had been placed on a plaque, which graced her statue outside the grounds of the GeoFront, and was mirrored above in Tokyo-3.

Time had passed, as they worked. Shinji was no bioengineer, mechanic, scientist or even had the vaguest idea how the system worked, when he took the reins of NERV, a rank amateur among giants. He had piloted, but if anything had been proven about Shinji Ikari since his time in Tokyo-3 began, it was his will to survive. And survive he had. Survived and flourished. Watching, learning and doing all he could to make up for so many other's mistakes, he'd finally come into his own.

"Shin, I have your status on L2 here."

Mana's voice cracked over the comm circuit, and despite the bitter, bloody tang of LCL in his mouth and nose, Shinji smiled. "Copy, what's the lowdown, Mana?"

Taking a breath, the auburn haired woman settled beside Maya with a grin, stealing away her console microphone with a small nod of apology. "Marginal success. The original Lilith samples proved insufficient to sustain a viable clone body, or organ material. We could not do a full growth clone as... well. It was Lilith."

Chuckling, Shinji had to concede that point. "Not like we could, or would, clone one of those again." Pausing, his mind cast back to his time as a pilot and the somewhat cheerful cast on his face faltered.

"You OK there, Boss?"

"Maya..."

"Shin," Mana's voice stilled his admonishment, and he snorted LCL and shook his head slowly. Still ruled by women, he mused quietly. His longtime girlfriend and now supremely competent executive liaison had managed to be his buffer and lens, when it came to the business that was NERV. At once she softened his sometimes blunt or awkward interactions, and also kept his focus sharp, always sure to keep the vital things under his eye. She blamed the JSDF upbringing, and being a shadow of her lab-rat father. He surmised she was just brilliant and a fast study. "Anyway, we're making progress on the other side of things. Team three has been building microcellular organelles, Mitochondrial factories, that have shown a production synthesis approximate to half our needed material quota. The team estimates a 97.6 percent match to Lilith-type LCL within the quarter."

He allowed himself a smile, reaching up and running a hand over his chin. "Excellent. Then I want the proposals for the new NP recombinant systems started immediately. I want project ideas and portfolios on my desk in one month."

The goal, currently, of NERV was to perfect and reliably offer the benefits of the Nephilim Project's findings, to the public. NP recombinant technology was depended on two main factors: A steady supply of LCL for the body to be suspended in, maintaining tissue support and homeostasis, and a sufficiently complex nanomechanical soup that would be used to flush the body of impurities, repair damage, and in the event, make the needed changes.

Nanomachines were the path to go, as the other option, retroviruses, were still hard to culture effectively. Protein based and fully bio-absorbable nanomachines were much easier to produce, sustain, predict, and dispose of. They also had the benefit of not having the word 'virus' in their name, which as Shinji's PR team assured, helped things immensely. "Let it be magic and multisyllabic, but never try to pretty up the plague," one had said. The process and logic behind what the NP system offered, depended on those two key technologies, and as things stood, they required each other. Without the primordial soup of LCL, the machines cannibalized the body for materials and the lack of a medium by which it could be controlled, and without the machines, LCL was no more than an icky bath, that you could soak in indefinitely.

If the recyclers worked, he swore as another mouthful of the fouled amber stuff curdled in his throat. "Damnit, who built these filters!"

I O I

"Mr. Ikari, we've arrived."

Starting back to awareness, Shinji saw the gentle, angular rise of NERV central before him, and took a steadying breath. Looking to his glass, his brow rose. The cup of bourbon had been finished, during his daydreaming. Pouring himself another, he took the glass with him, as an aide rushed to his side, portfolio in hand. "Sir, I have the day's current news and itinerary."

The standing Director of NERV Enterprises stared at the young man and blinked. "Where's Mana?" Without waiting for an answer, he strode off, a Section-2 shadow behind him as he stalked up the small foyer to the main doors. The aide blinked, mouth working silently, before running to catch up to the human dynamo.

"Sir! Sir!" Finally pulling astride the man, who still hadn't slowed, the aide opened the first portfolio and started rambling off stock numbers, trying to detail the various holdings NERV had that were key to the business's success. "And also the stock in WCD is up-"

Shinji pulled to so sudden a stop that his drink sloshed out of the cup slightly. The wind from the door's opening ahead of him set his dark hair flipping into his face, as he stalled, "Hold on. WCD is _up_?"

"Yes, sir. Western Carbon Dynamics stock took a heavy upswing this morning," the aide explained, thinking the Director happy with the news. Additionally, he was pleased that Director Ikari was finally paying attention to him. "I have to say that their new venture in the-"

"Sell it all."

"E-excuse me?" Shrugging, the man started down the hall again, as the flustered aide scratched a hasty note and jogged after. "Sir?!"

"WCD is our main supplier for carbon nanoweave correct?"

Consulting the portfolio a moment, the aide didn't see Shinji's amused smirk in his direction. The question was rhetorical, and he knew the answer already. "Yes, sir. They provide most of our outsourced carbon needs."

"Sell it all. Also, tell me what the current resource funding for branch... Three is. I need the monthly pool level."

Perplexed the man obliged, "Branch four is at sixty-eight percent resource pool, down... ten percent since last month, sir."

Nodding quietly, Shinji took another long drink from the glass tumbler he held. "Sell it all. Put a memo for resources to draft a five percent shift to bolster branch three."

"B-But sir!" The man went quiet when Shinji turned his eyes to him, the color gone that dangerous stormy gray that was infamous in NERV for meaning trouble. Nodding hastily, his objections forgotten, the aide made the needed notes to put Shinji's orders into action. He didn't remind the aid to leave him, as he entered the main offices, his father's previous lair, and crossed the now busy room to his spartan desk.

Sitting and heaving a sigh, Shinji looked out the windows, down onto the bustling hive that was the NERV workforce. Gone were the Eva cages, long since abandoned for research space and development labs. The many stories of dead air zones had been filled, the invasion of the JSDF doing them an underhanded favor by cracking he base's shell. Airlifted materials had proven simpler to work with and transport, speeding the rebuild of the structure, and the revamping of it's offices and space.

His chair swiveled, and he looked out over the office, it's floor littered with standing cases, glass cubes and towers, memorials to the past. Working and model copies of the technology Evangelion had wrought. Progressive edged tools, positron containment systems, cyclic energy refraction systems. Mechanical schema for the first artificial S2, supersolenoid, engine. The phrase was misleading.

Solenoids, simply, were coils of material, through which a current passed to generate a magnetic field. Practically, a simple on-off system, analogous to an electric valve. Dr. Katsuragi, Misato's father, had through study, found a parallel in the biology of Angels, but on a much more complex, much grander scale. Shinji stood and looked over the schematic again, marveling at it's complexity.

Dr. Katsuragi's research was done against Adam's original S2 engine, dubbed so because it was originally thought to be responsible for the AT field phenomenon. Work on this went parallel to the first attempts to really understand the thing that was then classified as Adam.

Shinji had access to all this, now. He knew, as much as one could, as much as one wanted to know about the Evas, Angels, the fabled Dead Sea scrolls. If the knowledge, information was there, it was available. He could see why SEELE styled themselves the heralds, gods even, of a new age for man.

Those attitudes were the fuel for the destruction that was Second Impact, when the First Angel, then simply Adam, had been reduced to a dormant, seed form again. Supposedly, that same S2 engine, organ, had been the cause. Activating it incorrectly inside of Adam, had reduced almost all the being's mass to energy.

Again, it all came back to the S2 engine.

Angels, those things that were resonances of Adam's influence and byproducts of it's will, all bore that same technology, something absent in Lilith and those things of it. It was what defined and separated those two entities, and made them incompatible. Perhaps that was why, initially, the scientists who were doing such things to Adam, took the course they did. Envy.

Shaking his musing away, Shinji looked over the schema again.

This supersolenoid engine had as much resemblance to a simple solenoid as that device had to a kitchen magnet. Forces of electricity drove the simple device, whereas the S2 was driven by a complex subatomic reaction, finite in capacity, that freed parity-bond particles and had them change values, perpetuating the reaction at the quark level. Thus, the Angels had their 'infinite' matter-to-energy conversion engine. The source of their fabled power. A human work, which his teams were still after decades trying to perfect, could not compare. The best they'd managed, which was written here, was a palladium-lattice device, that held a charged torus of excited hydrogen. Palladium's only claim to fame was that feature, but it had become fabled itself as research continued.

"To think. Such a pretty metal, once used by engravers to avoid the tarnishing that silver acquired, could absorb and contain nine-hundred times it's volume in hydrogen." A solid state reactor. The limitation of the current, and then, fusion technology was that it was large, expensive to start, and hard to maintain. Palladium changed that, simply by it's nature. It's ability to hold the charged, reactive mass of hydrogen made things so much simpler. It was both control rod, and containment field. It limited the amount of energy that could be released from the reaction, and that which could be injected. More excitable forms of the metal yielded heavier yield reactions. Pressurized toroids of gaseous palladium hexafluoride were the first step, and from there the succeeding ones only became smaller, and smaller.

Or so he was told. Grinning ruefully, he could understand the logic, but how his teams came up with these things, he'd never fathom.

Shinji was no slouch, in the practical science department, despite not being the burgeoning genius Maya was, or the subtle social engineer that was Mana. Having been exposed to Project E since nearly his birth, the young Ikari had grown up, and then matured, around high science. His arena, was the realm of theory, and there he excelled. He also, grudgingly admitted, had his father's talent for leadership. This he tempered with compassion, though, which was why NERV wasn't the dreaded, totalitarian, para-military megacorp it had been. Now it was just a totalitarian, para-military megacorp, with stocks and had a listing on Wall Street and Nasdaq. But science, technology were the basis for that success. Soon, the last of his great plans would be accomplished, and then Shinji felt, he'd really have repaid his father's debt to mankind. The S2 mk II, still in planning, was a more efficient, and less costly, version of the original, backwards engineered from salvaged Angel biology. It would solve not only the vast needs of NERV for energy, it would also be key, if successful, in balancing the world's energy crisis. If they could get it functional. So far the best they'd managed, was the new reactor under NERV HQ, which discreetly powered the site. This of course, was not on the UN books. Secrets, like old habits, were both addictive and had a tendency to die hard.

He had initially experienced qualms about using alien organs as possible templates for energy sources, but the practicality of it was too alluring. "Clean energy, limited only but the reactive mass, and bandwidth of the outbound circuits. Inert once offline, with no waste. Mm, sexy." Chuckling at his use of Mana's catchphrase, he sighed, remembering the other thing that he had to work on today.

He found it amusing, that he could stand in front of a hall of scientists, and expound the virtues of this new technology, and do it well, yet he could not fathom telling the one person he was closest to, the one more critical factor in almost every aspect of how he dealt with NERV, one small, easy thing.

Telling her he was dying.

The irony of it wasn't lost on him. Shinji Ikari and irony were long bedfellows.

I O I

He sat up too fast, his heart fluttering and vision going dim at the edges. He could hear Mana asking him something. She seemed far off, her voice muted, as the woman's arms snaked about his shoulders, trying to keep him upright as they stood, walking along the halls of the base. "I'm fine, really. Just a little woozy," he tried to assure her. Shinji had no idea if his words even came out correctly.

"I'd blame your drinking, but you're uncharacteristically sober today," she'd jibed, her expression grim. "How long has this been happening?"

"How long?" Shinji tried to muster the energy to lie, and only managed a laugh. "What makes you say this has 'been going on'?"

"Section-2, for starters."

Making a sour expression, Shinji once again, perhaps for the five-thousandth time, cursed that internal agency. "Knew I should have scrapped them when I got the place. Like fumigating for roaches, you know? Necessary housekeeping."

"Shin," Despite his state, he could feel the exasperation rolling off her. This was always a bad subject with Mana, probably due to her upbringing, and how intertwined it was to the JSDF. "You realize that the oh, I don't know, weekly assassination attempts are only avoided because of them, right?"

"It's no more than monthly, and yes, I know." Steadying his breathing, Shinji tried to regain some of his composure. He didn't care about the public opinion thing, but had insisted on recuperating out of the common view. It was more that he guiltily clung to even these painful moments, alone with Mana, and cherished each one he could scrape, steal and bully his way into. Currently, the two were the sole residents of a very spacious broom closet. "Just because I hate them, doesn't mean I don't need them. Or appreciate them."

"Somehow, I don't think hating something, and appreciating it can really happen, in this universe, Shin."

"You obviously never got to know Asuka the way I did," was his reedy retort, his breath still not coming in the proper cadence. The look she shot him could have backed down his father. He had to break that glare, and an idea formed in his clearing mind. Mana started and shot him a smoldering look. "Well, you seem to be recuperating quickly."

Favoring her with a slight grin, Shinji slid his hand somewhere less scandalous. "Complaining, Miss Kirishima?"  
"I may start, since you moved your hand..."

An hour later, he was re-buttoning his shirt, but not from more pleasant activities. "Nothing?"

"I... really don't know, Boss," Maya had acquired the odd habit of addressing him that way, some time after the reformation of NERV. It had seemed so hard for her to deal with someone so young as her superior, so to maintain the public face of things, and add a bit of levity to the situation, they'd come up with her trademark moniker for him. Initially he was amused by it, but when it'd become her standard way to address him, it'd quickly lost some of it's amusement value. "It scans like congenital heart disease, but doesn't seem to react to any kinds of normal treatment. Perhaps when the NP system is fully functional..."

Shinji laughed, low and with a smile. "Do you think I have that much time?"

Maya just looked away.

"How about what's causing it? These things usually show up early in life, don't they?"

Nodding, the tech dug back into her data, glad to be given something more comfortable to do, than try to mock up some nonexistent bedside manner. She was lousy with bad news. "From what I can gather, it's either the result of some flaw you received from recorporating after the fourteenth, or from your massive exposure to reverse AT fields during... " her voice went still, as the woman started to visibly shake. Shinji slid off the table and crossed to her side, laying a steadying arm about her shoulders, guiding her to a chair.

"Hey, it's OK. I get what you mean... just sit a sec. Alright?" When she nodded, sniffling, he turned, and sighed. He'd gotten better at comforting people, but still wasn't good at it, after all this time. And here she was upset about one of the most painful parts of his life, as well. Standing, Shinji took a breath and let it loose slowly, remembering the first time he'd tried to comfort someone... "Yeah, hope you're watching this Misato," he muttered, hand clenching at his side.

"What, Boss?" Maya punctuated her question with a hiccup.

Rounding on the young tech, Shinji kneeled down and took her hands in his, smiling up at the woman, peering into her brown eyes intently. "Listen, hey...hey." Maya's tears were sniffled back, and she looked down into the deep, blue eyes peering back at her. "There. There you go. Now, remember back then? Back before Third Impact?"

Lip quivering, the young woman nodded, memories of those horrible days surfacing in her eyes. "...yeah."

"Good. Then you also remember that despite it all, from the Third Angel, to Third Impact, I made it. I survived. Right?" Maya nodded, "Good. Good, you remember. Then keep that in mind, because too much is still going on. Too much is left to do, NERV still needs me, even if you guys are the real brains about town."

Laughing quietly, Maya wiped at her eyes and regarded him with a half smile. "And what does the Invincible Shinji bring to the table?"

"Why, my sparkling personality," leaning forward, he rested his forehead to hers. "Seriously, though. You're the brains. Mana's the face, the branches are the hands. Thousands of people make up the body, and all I do, all I am is... is."

"Heart, Shinji." Reaching up to run her hand along his cheek, the young tech leaned forward, her breath warm on his chin. "Heart..."

"I see you're feeling better." Shinji started, the sudden motion knocking the two's skulls together rather painfully. "Shall I tell the proposal team to assemble or will you need some time, Director?" Mana stood, smirking and leaning against the door to the examination room.

Rubbing at the bruise he was sure would be visible in the next few minutes, the young Ikari grinned up at his executive Assistant. "I think we're done here, right Maya?"

"Right, Boss," one eye still shut, the now nervous head of the technical division busied herself with putting away all the various analytical tools that had been laid out. This conveniently also let her avoid the burning gaze of the most formidable woman in NERV. "I'll have the full diagnosis and results sent up soon."

Collecting her employer, the smirking woman led the way down the corridors, Shinji trailing a pace behind. "That wasn't what it looked like."

Raising a brow, Mana regarded him briefly, "and what did it look like?"

"It looked like... Ah, I was..."

"You were?"

"I was trying to comfort-"

"Oh she looked _very_ comfortable," Mana's blue eyes, nearly a match for his own, glared back over her shoulder.

"Mana, slow down," pausing a moment, he leaned on the wall to catch his breath, panting slightly. Immediately the auburn haired woman was at his side, looking up at him intently, searching his face for a sign of trouble. Grinning suddenly, the young man slipped an arm around her shoulder. "You know me. Better than anyone."  
"I know you're trouble," sighing, Mana leaned on the taller man, as they made a discreet path along the deeper hallways to the conference room. "Knew you were trouble when I learned you were living with that lush and the demon. Knew it when I saw Ayanami staring at you every day."

"Did she really stare?"

"She _always_ stared," chuckling, the woman elbowed him half-heartedly. "But you know what?"

"What? You going to tell me it was love at first sight? Or that love conquered the lines of orders and borders and brought us together, despite being on two sides of the same coin?"

"You're such a sap." Laughing openly now, Mana ruffled his hair, as the two stopped outside a keyed panel that would let them into the waiting room, through a side door. "What I was about to say," she said, straitening his collar and tie, as he pulled the wrinkles from her sleeves. "Is that I like trouble."

"I'll make it a point to get into more," he quipped, earning him foot planted on the arch of his own. "OK, ow."

"Straiten up, we're here."

Looking from his cramping foot to her incredulously, the Director of NERV blinked as the wall collapsed to the sides and the board room spread out before him.

I O I

"Sir?"

Wandering down memory lane again, Shinji berated himself quietly. "Yes, what is it?"

"There's another memo from the Security Council waiting for your attention, sir." The aide from earlier stood, looking nervously through the door at him.

Shinji waved the man in, searching under his desk for the bottle he knew was there. He came back up a moment later with a full cup and a smile. "So, what do the old men have to say today? And where's Mana?"

The man seemed to shift uncomfortably on his feet. "The... they requesting additional information about the allotment of funds that were diverted from branch four, seven and nine to branch... three. In Germany."

"There was no fund shift. It was a clerical error that was addressed in the last meeting I had with the Secretariat. And the ESC." Leaning forward, Shinji rested his chin on a hand, but didn't focus on the man. "Every dime that comes into NERV, has a label when it leaves. Meaning, that though we are a privately owned, publicly traded company, every aspect of our economics is tracked thanks to my father's legacy. If those fund shifts actually happened, then we would be shut down. End of story."

In his first show of backbone since that morning, the man gestured insistently at the folio he held."Th-then who sent this memo?"

Shinji smiled at the man, shrugging and taking a draw from his glass. "You tell me." Turning to his left, he seemed to nod to the blank wall. "It's time."

Section-2 agents seemed to materialize from the walls, as Mana stepped out and crossed to Shinji's side. NERV's Director sat stoically, watching the proceedings with a slight interest. "They keep getting worse," Mana stated, taking the memo and peering at it critically, as she settled at Shinji's right.

The aide, looking around himself and at the Section-2 agents that surrounded him with wide eyes, finally fixed his gaze on Mana. "Y-you you're supposed to be sick. S-supposed to not be here."

"I don't know what rag you're working for, but they obviously didn't send _you_ the memo," she replied, slipping the false paper into a folio she was carrying. "I never take a day off. Never." Shinji motioned with his finger, and the agents closed in and took the man into custody. He moved off without complaint or resistance, merely another actor trying to capitalize on a program they'd implemented some time ago. "Track him back to his employers, find out who he works for. Then get the data to me."

"Yes Ma'am."

The awkward debacle vacated Shinji's office, and he loosed a sigh, resting the glass against his forehead. "Was that necessary? I really think you need a new hobby."

"What? Shutting down tabloids and spin rags is fun," Mana purred, settling on the corner of his desk and folding her hands across the lap of her skirt. "Besides, it minimizes the amount of further slander we have to deal with in the future. Which, in the long run, will help us get out from under the UN's thumb."

Shinji laughed ruefully at this. "Why would we need to? I'm content to be something that I can let the light of day shine on. I don't like secrets." This statement left a bitter taste, unrelated to the drink in his hand, lingering in his mouth.

Running a hand over her eyes, Mana nodded, mirroring Shinji's sentiment. "I know. And I know how you feel about this, really I do. You have to look at this from my side though, even though I ultimately answer to the JSDF and your keepers, the stress on the company is amazing."

"I know, it's in the psychological reports every month. 'Stress via constant observation'. Anxiety."

The auburn haired woman nodded. "So, the sooner that you get NERV out of that spotlight-"

"The sooner the JSDF reassigns you, and I quit, and go to boot camp."

Laughing at their long-time joke, she leaned over and straitened his collar. "You know I'd stay."

Nodding, he simply stared off, eyes unfocused. A lifetime's worth of thoughts kept circling around his head, and now, alone with her, something of that was breaking free of his usual calm. "Mana, what are we here for?"

The sudden change in topic, from anyone else would be taken in stride. Her her razor wit would compensate, engage her verbal fencing reactions, and from there it would be a delicate dance of point, counterpoint and feint that would let her analyze precisely what the person wanted, wanted to hear, and what her ideal response should be. From Shinji, she automatically turned all that off and answered frankly, her first impulse. "What?"

"Exactly. I mean, I had a purpose before," standing, Shinji slipped a hand over her shoulder, staring out at the memories in their display cases. "I was a pilot."  
"And I was a spy, sent to gather intel on you, and ultimately betray you."

"You did a great job, by the way," Shinji replied, favoring her with a grin. "No, what I mean is... now. What are we here for. We've survived all three Impacts. The one that started the earth's life processes, the one that man began to usurp a faulty ideal of God, and the last in an attempt to become God." Heaving a sigh, Shinji turned and looked out into the space, formerly occupied by the cages. "What are we, as humans, meant to do? We became the predominant species on earth. We defeated the spawn of Adam. What now? What's our great challenge, our magnum opus?"

"Shinji... those are questions, maybe without your milestones, that people have asked since... well since. I don't think you're going to find an answer that satisfies you. Not on the scale of humanity at least." Her face cast softly, Mana regarded her employer, long time friend, and fiancée with a small smile. "It's much easier, to look at yourself here. Like you said, you were a pilot. Is this about NERV? Has something gotten to you? One of those damn spin rags?"

"I... no. I just... Mana," he reached up then and took her hands in his, closing his eyes to keep from seeing the deep, tumultuous pools of cobalt that she was regarding him with. "I just have some things on my mind."

Laughing very lightly, Mana gestured to the corner, the well-cared for cello in it's place there, the darkened stand and seat easily overlooked. "That's you, with something on your mind. That's you," she pointed again, to the whiteboard on the wall by the desk, still filled with thought-flow diagrams, scribbled math and questions. "This is you," tilting his chin up with a finger, she sighed against his forehead. "So tell me Shinji, what is it you're trying so hard to not tell me."

"It's too soon. I... " laughing ruefully, he looked up and she could see again the young man, harried and worn that had been her target, so long ago. The image both lifted and made her heart ache. His next words almost made it skip. "Mana... I'm dying."

I O I

The core of Central Dogma, Terminal Dogma, so long the basis of Project E's dummy plug system, as well as the birthplace of the Evangelions themselves, had changed much it's first visit by Shinji Ikari. Perhaps named from Francis Crick's statement on the the matter of genetics, that information flowed in a single direction; DNA, to RNA, to proteins. This was later revised, at the discovery of certain viruses, that use RNA to alter DNA. Finally, the last step was made when protein-like complexes, produced by Lilith and carried directly in her blood, LCL, were found to have the potential to alter simple genetic structures. From these findings, the Nephilim Project began, and gave birth, literally, to Rei Ayanami.

Terminal Dogma, aptly named as it's ultimate purpose was not to relate the law and flow of genetic information, but rather the destruction and singularity of it. "I really don't see what sticking me in the aquarium is going to achieve here."

Three sets of eyes stared blankly at him, then returned to their work. "We're isolating what is causing the deterioration of your heart and nervous system, by analyzing it against some of the originally charged Lilin LCL that you had come in contact with, on your first activation with Unit 01."

"I think I saw that episode of Star Trek, wasn't it the one where his head ended up on backwards and-"

"There's likely some correlation between your time in Eva, or something along that timeline during which you piloted that caused this," Kirishima interrupted, glaring at the man in the tank. She wasn't a on the medical staff, or a scientist, but she insisted on being present, so Maya had allowed her to stand in as her assistant during the tests, and offering another pair of eyes and hands to the monitoring of the results. Also, it would keep her from exploring the possibility that one could in fact have sex in LCL, not something Maya doubted the woman would try, if left to her own devices.

"Not to mention, that due to the nature of our current progress in the NP system, we can halt any degenerative action that could be currently affecting your body," Kodama Horaki added, acting in as chief medical liaison, as Maya was working as her role of lead technician. Shinji knew he should be flattered that three of the brightest, most lovely women of NERV were so concerned with his wellbeing. That didn't change the fact he was currently treading 'water' in Rei's old clone vat. Naked. "We really need a new place to run these tests..."

Mana sighed, and looked up at the anxious man suspended in the amber tank before her. "I know, Shinji. But we are still in the logistics phase of this – we still have at least six months before a practical application for NP tech will be ready for prototype. There's tests, and applications, and then a literal sea of red tape, since this goes right at that human cloning ban perpendicularly."

Shinji sighed amber foam. "I know. Trust me, I know. Just... you weren't here."

Walking up to the foot-thick glass, Mana laid a hand there, smiling gently as Shinji drifted, tethered by a forest of electrodes, monitoring equipment and signaling relays. "I know. I would have been if I could."

"We're ready." Maya's simple signal had Mana scurrying to her post, as the man watched. He imagined, in a terrified corner of his mind, this same view, through crimson eyes. His father, coming in and watching him. Being analyzed and dehumanized at each turn, knowing that each individual aspect of self her acquired was only a flaw to be erased. Knowing that his life held no meaning beyond his designs, And worst of all... accepting those things.

Closing his eyes to banish those phantoms, he instead focused on a poem, something he received from Rei that he carried with him, in memory, since their last real conversation. "Mountains. Heavy are the mountains, but that changes over time..."

The others watched as the data flowed, progressed along the paths that would have been impossible before the advent of Evangelion. "He's meditating, during this. Still amazes me," Maya idly remarked, as she adjusted the density of charged LCL in the chamber.

"He's not meditating," closing her eyes, Mana stretched her neck slightly, face twisting in slight pain, then release. "He's talking to her."

Kodama looked up, letting the monitors do their work unattended for a moment. "Her?"

"Rei. He's talking to her. He does this, sometimes. More often since... since he'd gotten sick," crossing her arms, Mana paced about, her eyes switching between Shinji's slowly moving lips, and the readout before her. "After Third Impact, and seeing what he did, it's been like a prayer to him. I've heard him saying it before, on Tide Day." Recalling that holiday, Mana mused on it as her eyes swept over the readings, looking for those flags Maya had instructed her on.

Many countries had started observing the day after Third Impact, as Tide day. There was a general reverence for the ocean, a shared memory. All of humanity, pooled literally together there. A sentient, singular thing, coating the world like pearl does a grain of sand. Then it was over, that dream and memory. The world turned on, kept on moving. But the impression, the impact of it remained – some called it mass hysteria, some racial memory. Shinji, when she asked him about it, never spoke of what he thought, and only a deep look of pain in his eyes kept her from pursing that query. Mana had found Shinji, the year after Impact standing by the ocean, reciting an odd passage of poem or song, and in time had finally approached him about it.

It had been... awkward.

A few more minutes of his quiet benediction passed, and with a sigh Kodama rose from her station fitfully. "You should have told me," the eldest Horaki sister's lips pursed, as she tried to express her annoyance at a possible medical fact that had been omitted, and also worked at keeping an eye on the data before her. "Possible mental instabilities should be-"

Mana's eyes flashed over her terminal, "He's not unstable," she snarled, immediately calming. "He has a focus. If he didn't have... Rei, none of this would have happened. NERV, the NP system, all the advances that have happened would have been worth nothing." She was perhaps overstating things, but in truth it was Shinji's idea to turn the advances back on themselves, to maybe see what benefit the atrocities here could be. It was his drive to undo that, which had lead NERV out of darkness. "He was the will that drove things forward-"

"Mana..."

"He was the heart of the teams that pushed for the NP system to be revamped, and the only one with practical, real world experience with Eva and it's child tech-"

"Mana..."

Catching her breath, the woman looked to Maya and frowned, "What?"

"We have the results. We can get him out."

"Oh."

I O I

Those seated at the darkened table, were haloed in a harsh light, that picked them out and set to high contrast the lines of each face. The table itself was unremarkable, a simple, great circular thing. The people around it, though, were of note.

"Are we all in attendance... very well." Standing, the woman most knew through all of NERV as the second in command looked to each there, her eyes analyzing, measuring. "This meeting is hereby called to order." Normally, being held under such scrutiny would have a normal person wilting, or at least considering the closest escapes, but these were long-time associates, contemporaries and fellows to the woman. "The purpose of this council, and the object we will be deliberating until a suitable answer can be reached, lies in the fate of Shinji Ikari."

Faces rose, and dialogs were had. Representatives from all major and some minor divisions were present, some never before physically seeing the man in question. All in attendance had their measure in loyalty though. "What about the NP system?"

"Too far out," the voice was corrected, and faces fell, the easy answer denied them. "His condition is worsening daily. If this continues, we may have three months to six."

"There are the generation two LCL experiments... those have a higher sustainable life than the current Lilin LCL, if applied with the vectors."

Muttering commenced, but was finally silenced. "Too risky. Those could literally revert him back to a teenager, and the repercussions on nervous physiology would be debilitating."

More talk surrounded the table, and those in attendance were realizing quickly that things were not proceeding. That was until a chief of archives, his voice growing frail over time, took the floor. "Perhaps this isn't a single solution approach."

Mana eyed him, sizing the man up and recalling him from memory. "Explain, please."

"The NP system could be used in the future to cure his illness. Now, he is living on borrowed time. This is nothing new to the aged, but we now have much grander science to aid us.

"His degeneration can be stalled with the experimental NP system, and his condition stabilized by the same, until a cure can be found to permanently change his own bodies faulty coding. But those require a massive amount of raw power to be sustained. Those can, in the future be reprogrammed when the NP system comes online, for a full cure."

Maya, again called out the flaw in this idea. "We... would have no way to make this sustainable. He'd have to have almost daily infusions of activated LCL. They can only stay active very briefly. There's no way to use the LCL like this."

"There is a way, if he contained the energy source himself."

Silence fell over the room, as those in attendance looked from one to another with barely contained confusion. "I... how?" Mana's voice rang out, not confused but bearing a small kernel of hope.

Here, the man whose words they were hanging on like drowning men a raft, shook his head. "This I do not know. NERV is central to this new world. We build the machines, we program the computers. Within us, we have the power to save one life, though."

Maya's mind was working in objective mode, trying to find the answer to this puzzle. Finding some way to make the solution come out at her, and scream 'here'! It was the words the man spoke, that spurred her, set her mind to motion though. "Power... life." Gasping, she started shuffling about her notes, finally pulling free the last of them, a minor player she'd felt in this meeting but now suddenly critical. "The supersolenoid project."

Mana stood incredulous. "An S2 engine. You want to put an S2 engine... _into Shinji?_"

"We aren't in the dark ages of Angel propaganda here, Kirishima," a scientist heading the S2 project chided. "The engine isn't some mystical seat of the soul that was assumed, any more than the stomach is the 'golden engine' of ancient Chinese ideal." Shrugging the man continued. "Think of it like this.

"A solenoid, simple version. An electromagnet. The definition of the device is a three dimensional coil, that produces an EM field. Now, the basis behind the S2 project, was to build a whiteroom, technologically maintained version of the angel organ that provided the same function.

We originally picked the name "supersolenoid", because, in error, we felt the S2 was responsible for the AT field Angel's made. Now we understand what an AT field is and originates from. The S2 as we are developing it, is simply a massively powerful field generator, that in essence contains a stable fusion reaction."

"Would those fields not cause more problems? And well, a fusion reactor? That can't be good for you..."

Muttering erupted around the room, and another stood, this time a face Mana was intently familiar with. "The... palladium core of the current S2 engine... the lattice could be used as a low-bleed battery for excited hydrogen."

"A containement form?"

Conversation became heated again, but one thing had changed, since the small storm of ideas the aged archivist had fronted.

"I... I think it could work," Maya said, her eyes searching out Mana's as the woman sat at their head, despite the table's shape, watching with unbelieving eyes. "Mana?"

Her mouth working silently for a long moment, the auburn haired woman finally let herself fall, slumping into the seat with an audible sigh. "If it saves him. If it saves him, then lets make it happen."

Kodama Horaki stood at that, and it was with a rueful smile she regarded those around the table. "I don't think we've addressed the one problem with this."

Mana regarded her from her slumped position, looking through splayed fingers covering her face, "What would that be, 'Dama? Some medical concern with the oh I don't know, fusion reactor?"

"I wouldn't be a fusion reactor," Maya tried to correct weakly, but her voice had little strength.

Shaking her head, the eldest of the Horaki sisters paused a moment, letting the chatter about the table die down. "I think the factor we're all forgetting, is Shinji himself."

Mana's head impacted the table with a solid thump, her sentiments echoed around the table, "Well, fuck."

I O I

"Absolutely not!"

Kodama rolled her eyes and threw up her hands, looking over at Mana with her patented 'I told you so' glare. "Look, Shin, just let us explain-"

"No! You are not going to spend... how much would this cost?"

Aoba, drafted into the impromptu meeting had a moment of wishing he'd stayed in bed that morning. "Ah... from this facilities pool, it would only pull about one percent of the operating funds-"

"ARE YOU MAD?!" Shinji's outburst left the man winded and panting, before he spun the chair around away from the table. "No."

Mana stood and went to kneel down, looking into Shinji's eyes where he glowered out over the cages, the view from his office locked into perpetual motion. "Shin, listen. We still need you, and this would be a way for us to not only test these things, but save you. Will you please consider it?"

His eyes, a stormy slate looked back into her liquid blue and he sighed, shaking his head. "How can I rationalize it? At this point the money means nothing, it's what we do with it that makes this impossible.

"The UN and JSDF, they'd shut us down for a fraction of that. And don't think you can rationalize it by saving me. I'm the biggest thorn in their sides. Without me, this all would have been theirs, and NERV would be easily folded up in a pocket and forgotten." Shinji coughed, settling his throat with a drink from the cup he always seemed to be nursing. With a slight snarl Mana snatched the cup from his hand, spilling the alcohol across the floor.

"Will you look at me." When Shinji just closed his eyes and sighed, she slapped him, screaming the demand at him again, startling not only the young man but those others assembled. "You are all I have. Don't get noble with me Shinji. I know you're a hero. You don't have to prove it by dying. Here."

Mouth working silently, he swallowed but still shook his head. "I can't. I can't sacrifice all those here, all of those who's lives are a part of NERV..." he trailed off as the woman turned and stalked off, a hand up over her eyes.

"Damn you, Ikari," she muttered, before slamming the doors of his office behind her.

Sighing, defeated in so many ways, the Director of NERV turned his chair slowly and regarded those assembled, to convince him to save himself and damn them all, with tired eyes that didn't belong to someone only twenty years of age. "You're all dismissed. Take the day off, work. Whatever you want." Slowly, he spun the chair back around, letting them do as they liked.

The Horaki daughter remained, Hikari's sister he reminded himself. What had happened to Hikari, he wondered idly, until she laid a hand on his shoulder. "You have to forgive her. She's just worried, upset."

Nodding woodenly, Shinji didn't raise his eyes. Still, he looked out across the cages, remembering a giant that held a soul, not it's own. "I know. I just can't do as I please." Laughing mirthlessly, he looked up finally, and the intensity of his gaze burner her. "You think I'm ready for this? After all that time piloting, thinking any day I'd die, only to survive it and now this?"

She swallowed a knot in her throat and her hand tightened on his shoulder, shadows cast by her hair obscuring her eyes as her head bent. "I... I'm sorry."

"We all die," he stated slowly, evenly. "I just believe it's how we live that makes the difference." Kodama left him, and in the silence and cold of his office, Shinji contemplated. He set about arranging his affairs, but the finality of such a thing upset even his borrowed resolve and in time he just stopped, eyes distant and unfocused as they listlessly scanned the room.

He buzzed the desk Mana often used, knowing if not she, then another would be there. "Yes, Director?"

"I need to schedule a flight to Germany. Call Section-2 and make them aware, additionally have a memorandum sent to Miss. Kirishima. Prepare my plane, and call ahead to Branch three. I leave as soon as the engines are warm."

"Right away, Director."

I O I

Looking around he had to admit, the stories he'd been told about the countryside of Germany didn't do it justice. Gazing down at the Branch three complex, all he could think of was the cold, the wind and the rain that was pelting the small group as they took in the sights. "I really hate Germany."

"Sir?"

"Nothing," turning, the taller man gestured, and his retinue followed as he started down the path to the cars, idling where they had left them. His mind cast back to five, maybe six years ago, and a similar day where he watched the great towers and many buildings that made up his home retreat, safe to their sanctuary. Here, he mused, there was no sanctuary. "The staff are waiting?" A nod was his answer, and again his eyes, blue as the skies of this place, turned to the rise of Branch Three, as it rose up at the end of the road they'd travel. He was relieved that it looked nothing like it's sister branch in Tokyo-3, settling back into the back seat of the sedan. "Lets go see the family," he murmured to the bottle of bourbon as he poured a short glass for himself. Tossing it back he sighed, letting the warmth soak into him.

It was at the end of his sigh, that the first shell impacted the lead car and had the sedan erupting into a ball of fire and debris as his own vehicle spun out of control, crashing into the guardrail and then the embankment that guided the road to the valley below. Barely aware of what was happening, Shinji held on and looked around frantically, seeing nothing but fire and earth being tossed up in the wake of heavy gunfire. Not surprising, the thought that crossed his mind wasn't for his own safety, but regret over how he and Mana had parted.

Another impact, closer this time, threw the car on it's side, and here Shinji knew no more.

I O I

"I can't believe we missed this one," Mana remarked, as the woman she'd been using as a personal assistant was escorted out of the offices by Section-2 security. The two men were quiet and efficient as usual, and with a sigh she sat at the desk, usually her own.

So much was happening recently that she'd barely been there. She's promoted a woman from the administrative staff to take over clerical work, but somehow another of the damn moles had made it past screening. "Shin?"

Silence was the only response to her page, and she blinked at the intercom, checking it's connections. Rising, she went to the large doors and slipped inside quietly, calling again when the inky room didn't light to her presence, maintaining the same dark as when she'd entered. "Shin?"

A small, cold ball of dread took residence in her stomach, and the woman sped back to the desk the woman now being taken to a Section-2 questioning cell had been at recently. "Please," she begged, to no one in particular, hands flying over the untidy mess there. It took her a few moments, but finally she located the scraps of information, and over the next few minutes, pieced the clues together.

Uncharacteristically, she sat a score of minutes, staring vacantly ahead. The clocks on the wall told her the times, at each branch office. It was just half an hour past the time Shinji would be due at Branch Three. Security monitors showed him not entering the building.

Reaching mechanically, she pressed the key to page Section-2. "Yes, Ma'am?"

"Director Ikari is to be considered missing, presumably by force. Alert all Branches. I'll be in meeting with the JSDF."

"We'll see you there, Ma'am," the agent assured her, and she thanked him quietly, seeing herself to the doors as her mind tried to grasp what was happening.

_Shinji was missing_. As if things weren't already spiraling down, now this. Section-2 agents pulled her car around, and she was spirited to a meeting with the heads of the Japanese military, something she was not looking forward to. Opening her phone, she dialed a number from memory, "Yes, sir. Kirishima reporting in..."

* * *

A/N: Nope!


	2. Chapter 2

**Heroes of Evangelion**

**An Iron Will**

I O I

"Report."

Her long training and experience in the military and a personal need to show no weakness were the only things that kept her from licking her parched lips in an attempt to ease the sudden dryness of her mouth. The room before her was arranged in typical military Tribunal style – three chairs, occupied by three heads of whatever departments seemed relevant. Perhaps it was a nod to some ideal that a single branch could not mete out punishments without it's peers there to offer support or balance. Perhaps there was simply a lack of trust. Again, she assured herself that she was not on trial – that she was not at fault and that her irrational fear was only that.

Oh, it could be base human nature, the same that drove the massive crowds during the French Revolution and it's great hero, Madame Guillotine, a dark voice in her mind offered, shattering that uneasy calm she was trying vainly to establish.

None of these images helped work her tongue loose from the roof of he mouth, where it seemed cemented. With effort, she let her eyes unfocus and lent her voice to trained memory, something she had always had. It was like a switch flipped in her mind, and suddenly she wasn't attached to those memories, those feelings. Such was her nature, that of what her country needed her to be. She bore it no ill will – after all, she was one of many. She was at once unique and a gear in a greater machine. To her, Patriotism was less idyllic defense of some vaulted ideals as the defense of critical identity.

She was Japan. She was their effort, made flesh, given purpose, empowered.

Intelligence agencies were by nature, efficient, decentralized bodies that were as strong as their field agents. As such, those agents received the best, if not the the most humane, training for their callings. One would think that something like Second Impact would unify humanity, but it only opened doors wide to some. Failing governments were prime targets for infiltration. Weak armies prey for PMC recruiting. In all, the machine that was humanity and it's divine imperative to be it's own annihilator simply accelerated. The surge of political and governmental turmoil resulted in five months of bitter warfare, waged outside of normal rules of engagement. No declarations of war, civil warnings, taboo targets. Bombs were laid out like rice thrown to wind, and hell was reaped on the winds of fury. There were no kind, probing attacks and feints of a government posing. No demonstrations of power to stave off further conflict. Massive deployments of munitions, heavy bombing, and guerrilla tactics added to the coastal Impact death count, reducing the world's population by half.

The Valentine Treaty was more an act of self preservation on the part of the collective warring states, than an actual sign of peace. Everyone saw where the world would be if hostilities continued, and by grudging accord, called off open war.

Private and secret wars were still fought. The damage was irrevocable in ways. Private Military Corporations, the sometimes derisively considered PMC, rose to dominance. People were too few, and wars too wide-ranging. Governmental armies were decimated, and the real toll of war was showing.

People lacked food, and industry. Patriotism was meaningless if the country starved, all the hands bearing guns and none plows. Those PMC armies became the staple for many a county's defense, as they were unwilling to sacrifice their own blood in conflict.

In time, some nations recovered. The UN became predominant, a policing force that oversaw and limited national armies and actions, all the while building splintered forces of it's own, in each nation. Called upon, the UN could annihilate any single body. The delicious irony, was that it's forces were not stable enough to do so, being made of those nation's people. A balance was there, in that the UN, at once separate and integrated, could not act unless it did so with full allowance by it's member states.

Upon such balances, of peace through threat, and the collective knowledge that any weakness could be exploited and used to usurp, had SEELE been given the power they possessed. It also opened doors for new kinds of war, and ways in which it could and was nurtured.

Mana Kirishima for instance, had been the daughter of what could only be called a soldier stable.

Such phrases irked her. The crèche had been comfortable, sustaining, and supplied her with all she needed since she could remember. She was trained early and well, earmarked at a young age for intelligence, where others were sent elsewhere. Some were simply sent away. Mana could always recall that the military, it's generals and admirals, were as much her fathers and mothers as those two nameless individuals that donated genetic material to her. More so. They had an active, obvious hand.

Which was also why, faced with the disappointment obvious on the three faces before her, she inwardly crumpled.

A small jealous part of her briefly allowed a nod to Rei Ayanami. She was perhaps the only other person the young JSDF operative could relate to, in such things. Not that she knew, or had been told such by the young woman herself. Shinji had been that connection, and perhaps that was why it stung and at once comforted her. That young woman's dehumanization had sensitized Shinji to such, and later when her own demons had come calling, lent him experience with them.

Her voice rattled off the day's events, dispassionate and precise. She marveled that such a thing were possible, even now. Mana knew she was by no means old, and was only sometimes seeing in herself the seeds of being jaded. Here though, her voice spoke of Ikari's absence, the day's progress, their talk, and then his subsequent disappearance, with as much feeling as if she were speaking of an errant cloud that obscure her view of the sun.

"Do you suspect a party in this action?"

Mana considered the question, and nodded, slowly. "I believe it would have best been handled internally. From within Nerv. Beyond that, the number of potential enemies Nerv has, and by proxy Ikari has, is as the sand."

One man seemed to consider this a moment, crushing the still embered end of a cigarette into an ashtray. "From anyone else, that could have been considered an attempt to shirk responsibility." Despite the acknowledgment it was was precisely not what she was doing, the insinuation still rankled her. "Why would there be a splinter group, counter to Ikari in action, within his own corporation?"

"Or is it more personal? There is the Second to consider, still," one of the men added.

She made a point to count to five with the breath she was expending. "I do not believe Asuka to be the instigator for this," Mana ground out, still thankful for her clinical detachment and it's distance to her own emotions. As it stood, she only felt a burning desire to visit unbridled destruction down like hellfire upon a certain demon, were that to be the case... but did not devote herself to that suspicion. Despite the two pilot's mottled history, they were amiable enough, if distant by necessity. "For one, it would be too easy, too predictable a situation. This has none of the earmarks of what scenarios built around her psyche should contain."

Silence reined briefly. "Very well, agent Kirishima. What do you plan to do from this point forward?" She took a breath, and let her mind play out possibilities, contingencies. As the lead liaison to Nerv from the JSDF and therefor the UN, she was in a very unique position. Shinji knew he had a spy in his employ – had known for a very, very long time in fact. He simply didn't care. If there was anything that could harm him, or cause problems for Nerv that the UN finding out would become critical, they'd simply eliminate the problem. It either ceased to exist on paper, literally, or with any ability to prove. Mana understood her loyalties. She was Japan's soldier, but she was Shinji's woman.

That he made it so easy for her to be both, and without guile or to press his own agenda...

"Rescue operations are already being mobilized. This will not be a case of an important personage slipping softly into the night." Mana could tell that the inquiry, at least in this stage, was complete and sketched a bow. "I will be leaving the country, to spearhead those actions."

"Unacceptable. Aside from Shinji, you are the most well-grounded person within Nerv that has a direct impact and connection to the staff. If something were to happen to him..."

"Indeed. This, though tragic, could play directly into the UN's best interest."

"No offense sirs, but he's not dead," her eyes were liquid threat, in blue. "And Nerv would not have me at it's head."

A few brows rose, and the men muttered amongst themselves for a moment. "Explain."

Despite the question, things had gone from formal, to personal, and as such she had already moved to the room's doorway. "For one, this is a private corporation, one lead by the son of what could be considered the greatest tactical minds of our age.

"Second, he's acutely aware of your... interest, in Nerv, and if it became apparent your, meaning my, hand were in action to take the reins of that beast, it would turn on itself and tear itself apart." Smiling in the half light, she opened the door and considered her next words well. They could, after all, be the last she uttered to her superiors. "Make no mistake, that Nerv is the Ikari's beast. It will obey no other masters."

I O I

Shinji's world was a haze of pain, sound, and light, all separate sensations he knew, but the way in which his mind was currently working, that meant little. Again, after so long from the Evangelion, he found that place again, within himself. A retreat, separated from the pain, separated from the now.

He looked about the gentle hills, grassy and mild, the sun warm above. Cicadas droned, a song he'd known since being small. That single tree rested there. Shinji looked about with detached nostalgia. Head tilted forward, his hair made a shadow across his face. Still lithe of frame, it was apparent as he took a breath –

And screamed.

The sky broke, and like disturbed ash, seemed to disintegrate in on itself, revealing a world made of sensations that blurred into a sickening miasma.

"He's coming back around." Voices blended into the pain and other sensations in ways he could not describe. It was like each syllable, the concepts behind those words flared in his vision like things on inky wings, tearing at his nerves.

Someone swore. "Put him back under. We can't have him screaming for hours on end again."

One of those shapes lingered. He thought it a figment, a blur of his vision. Others swooped and tore at him, memories of something horrible, unbelievable. This one stared back at him suddenly, dwarfing his vision, a black thing that was bigger, hungrier than the shadows around him.

Violet and verdant marked jaws broke free, and teeth the color of old blood and bone smiled at him.

Shinji began screaming again.

I O I

"How is he?"

The young woman sighed, shaking her head slowly. The once-white uniform she wore, symbolic to every culture, was stained and soiled. It was impossible to tell how old some of the blood was. "Dying."

A man, remarkable only in his utter unremarkableness, leaned forward and settled a piercing gaze on her. She shifted nervously. "You are here, to keep him alive."

The meaning behind his words wasn't lost on her. There was a large, limed pit behind the bivouac that she could otherwise be occupying, after all. Frustration won out over fear. "I know that," she hissed back at the man, clasping a hand over her mouth and biting her knuckle a moment later, realizing how such an outburst would be taken. "It-it's just that he's... there's already," her anxiety and fear had her hiccuping, and the man sighed. She jumped when a somewhat dingy glass, half full of liquor slammed down in front of her.

"Drink. Get your wits. You're no use to me, blubbering like an idiot."

She drank greedily, desperately. Her color returned, and with it a stability to her breathing. A few long moments as she settled her hitching breath and she began, again. "He has a degenerative condition. He was dying before he got here."

The man blinked. "I've never heard of this."

She snorted and pointed to the x-ray sheafs haphazardly hanging off the room's fluorescent lights. "I can't fake this. And trust me, considering what I found... it's surprising to me too."

Nodding, the man stood and looked over the closest film. He didn't doubt the young woman's words, only her motivations. It was risky, using her, but it was better than what he had. Her family was well known for their medical prowess, after all. She also knew the man first hand, and would be useful, in other ways once her medical prowess were no longer needed. "What can we do?"

She swallowed again, skin paling again behind the dusting of freckles. "There... isn't anything we can do. If there were some way to treat this, likely he'd have done it."

Glancing down to the nervous woman, he retreated to the seat he'd vacated. The man leaned back into the shadow there, steepling his fingers in front of his face, contemplative. She wouldn't lie to him, here. Not when the last doctor had been made such an example of. It would explain his fear and stupidity, in trying to escape though. "Sensible," he commented idly, considering what he could do with a damaged bargaining chip. "Ah."

The best bluff, he reasoned, was the one you believed yourself. After years of planning and intelligence, if he hadn't known about this... likely few others would either. "Make him relatively presentable."

Her eyes went wide and she looked to the corner, to the beeping machines and the man they warded. "Wh-what do you mean? He can't even be left awake-"

"I need him presentable, not conversational," without another word, the man left the woman to her work, and she suppressed a shudder at what she had to do.

Walking over to the bed, she called on every reserve of her training, her scant four years of medical school and all her sister's tutelage. The broken man, still resting fitfully in whatever dream or nightmare that held him, writhed there. She was taken, momentarily, with a nostalgic sadness. "Known you so long, and when I finally do get to see you sleep, it's like this." Memories returned, unbidden. She remembered class 2-A and the young pilots, so... unreal, next to everyone else. Rei and her cool, unapproachable exterior. Asuka's fire and passion, equally impassible. And between them, Shinji, with his emotional void, his quiet melancholy, improbable politeness.

Even when he told her about Touji. She'd... clung to him and his German roommate for a while, vacillating between anger and depression. Asuka and Shinji, her anchor, holding her to the earth in sadness and her kite, keeping her mind above it all, soaring above. Despite it all, she'd come to care, in a friendly way more than just a peer, about them all. Almost she'd thought to pursue a romantic interest in him. He'd politely, before she'd managed to get the nerve, asked her to stop seeing him so much, as he worried she'd displace her emotions onto him.

Hikari Horaki had been furious, that he'd assume she was so easily swayed, so flighty. Her denials were pointless, more for saving her own face and they both knew it. The gulf had been made, the sea impassible. She rested her hand along his forehead, and the man quieted in his nightmare, as she favored him with a small smile. "I'm so sorry, Shinji."

I O I

The only thing Mana missed about the old NERV, under Gendo Ikari, was the sense of having some real purpose in the latter part of her training. "All systems are green, pilot. Awaiting your signal," she heard in the background of the electronic noise that was her old partner's version of conversation. Despite her current state of employment, and romantic interest, she couldn't help but long for those times where prowess in her machine meant something more than a piloting mark on a spreadsheet. Closing down the bulky visor, she leaned back and released a breath, suppressing the urge to flinch as forty eight transductive fiber needles slid into her spinal column. State of the art in it's day and made of a pliable material, they were designed to, and had in the past, break loose of their primary connection interface, if she were say, blown out of her pilot's couch. The material, free of it's base matrix of conductive and transmissive structures, degraded into so much saline.

She still got creeped out thinking that she had _needles_ in her _spine_, regardless of how many times this had occurred in training or the field..

The couch was a large affair, impact dampened gel with a harness that would let her endure fatal impacts with little more than a slight jostle. The helmet itself was the most bulky and cumbersome of the devices, and it looked no less appealing than the couch, with it's suit-interface row of ports, for her back to rest against. She refused to think about the four ports at the back of the helmet.

"Raiden, status," her voice, produced more for her own sake, sounded inside the network of systems that made up the T-Raiden-T's interface environment. It looked, for lack of a better word, like outside. Things she focused on, picked up by coordinated signals that monitored her eye's reaction and focus location, in relation to the patterns her brain transmitted, were outlined and provided data for, by the Raiden system. The helm didn't so much transmit images with it's visor's array, as watch her, and how she reacted. That counter-impulse engine is what drove the system's basic interface.

She had been inside the plug of an Evangelion, and experienced the odd sensation of synchronization before, but this she preferred. It was a human work. Not the result of equal parts murder, science and alien biology. Like most soldiers she'd grown up around, there was a limit to the amount of 'magic' she could tolerate in her weapons. If something didn't break, clang, need oiling, or make you bleed, there was something wrong with it. The fact Shinji tended to agree with her, didn't help her negative opinion of those abominations.

"Systems operational, all contacts operating within parameters, reactor levels are..." the voice droned on, and she tuned it out, preferring the heads up display. Everything was just as she remembered it. Clunky, inefficient, literal and wonderful. Mana sighed happily and though the couch kept her immobile while piloting, outside of an emergency, she felt like dancing.

Outside, the JAF were witness to one of the rare launchings of their few real powered armors. The news of Shinji Ikari's odd disappearance was being muted by most channels, but like any human network, breathing was synonymous with information. You can't silence everyone. No one was terribly surprised then when the young pilot and Nerv liaison Kirishima ordered the reactivation of her armor unit. While some on base knew that the activation was going on, many only heard it along with the other rumor. War, though not as popular a topic, was also muttered in some circles. After all, why mobilize a billion dollar machine for a manhunt?

These thoughts had occurred to Mana. Her answer would have likely surprised them. Her teeth bared in a feral grin. Man hunt indeed, she thought outside the interface logistic. I certainly will be hunting someone, when I find out who's responsible.

A thunderous roar sounded out of the JAF A-15T hangar, and those present were reminded again, why it was that the JSDF had originally commissioned the T-Raiden-T armors to be made. The darkness of the hangars doors was suddenly banished as great machine's three scanning lasers swept the area briefly, before the auxiliary cameras activated. Two diagonal flashes along the behemoth's face glared from the darkness as the sound of thousands of tons of elastomer fiber and carbide alloys slowly walked out of the bay. Impressive on paper, the Raiden was stunning up close. A massive, lithe, and utterly predatory thing, it looked nothing like a tank, and everything like a hunter. It's design was twofold, in that it was at once functional, and intimidating. Recalling fundamental memory of predator species, it stalked, head low and shoulders hunched, a rolling, patient gait. It seemed tensed by it's posture, like a cat preparing to pounce, or a raptor preparing for it's eviscerating tackle.

The Raiden units her original team had consisted of were light combat and heavy fire-assist units, where she had a command platform, more suited to mobility, reconnaissance, and arena awareness. The end result was a lighter, more streamlined Raiden mech, with fewer chassis mounted armaments, but more 'soft mounts' where modules of various kinds could be integrated into the structure. It's initial pose was very low-slung, a bipedal stance with long, multi-jointed legs that ended in variable-contact stabilizers, essentially feet that varied based on surface. Larger surface area was expressed in situations where grip was needed. Areas were closed to points for anchoring and close quarters combat.

Mana grinned as she considered that last aspect of her mech. It gave a whole new concept to the phrase, 'axe kick'.

The legs also demonstrated the advancement that had gone on as not only Nerv, but the JSDF had progressed. Charge-phase elastomers, bound synthetic muscle made of tungsten carbide fibers and electrically reactive polymers, were used instead of bulky, failure-prone hydraulics. The nature of the materials gave a superior power to weight ratio, while maintaining an innate armored function. The muscle itself, was armor. Taking a queue but implementing it in a technological rather than biological manner, the machine itself was a parallel to vertebrate evolution, in that the muscle systems were controlled by redundant networks of the same transductive fiber she was using to interface with the Raiden unit. Electrical impulses were carried and transmitted to the fibers, which reacted to those as a muscle would – contracting or relaxing in turn. Additionally, the Raiden used a limited self healing paste, consisting of the base materials for all it's structures and active nanites that were programmed to use it. Given time and a sufficient supply of water for a reactive mass, the unit could 'heal' significant damage. Internal superstructures were alloyed, field-pressed composites, that could sustain heavy shock and impact without shear or buckle, and also offered the platform sufficient support.

Externally, the behemoth sported a 'fishskin' composite armor, superior to explosive-reactive types in that it deflected by surface shearing and collapse most shaped impacts. This made the external armor nearly impervious to anti-tank munitions, including tandem-charge kinds. The shaped scale pattern was a child of both the later Nerv and JSDF, a product of AT field application in composite compression of material, against modern tank armors. Forces unattainable by natural or lab means could be conducted via AT field 'sandwiching', allowing immense pressure. Those scales also by design broke up laser targeting, and small arms fire simply 'slid off'. As a last resort, the mech had adopted a technology initially labeled PDHK – point defense hard kill, a limited use system where multiple small cameras used spatial relative and prediction systems to counter attacks with weapons the unit had available, against missile and projectile attacks. The limitation to this, being the Raiden was forced to go stationary, for the systems to function accurately, but against massive munitions, like N2 mines, or unorthodox attacks, this was simply one of many options.

In size, it simply towered over the other vehicles at the base. VTOL lifts managed to get to it's knees, once it abandoned the hunched storage posture and rose to operational mobility. The legs contacted the trunk laterally, giving the body the option do drop between the limbs in evasive maneuvers. This version of the Raiden platform had no hard mounted 'arms', like it's brothers, having long been removed in favor of greater mobility and mount positions. It could have arms, for fine manipulation, or ballistic launchers for heavy fire support, additional electronic warfare abilities, or short range, anti-personnel munitions. The trunk itself was slender and offered little target opportunity, while a tail extended behind, for balance and ballast. There were liquid pump chambers, containing the reactive paste, that circulated through the mech, giving it further, finer balance.

The main difference, structurally, between the H-Raiden heavy tactical, and S-Raiden combat systems this one called brothers, were head and shoulder areas. The heavy propulsion batteries came off the shoulder structure like enormous, blunt flanges, folded wings that never unfurled. These batteries carried the main functional difference between the three initial Raiden units, in that the C-Raiden, Mana's, could fly. Originally the batteries had been massive vector aligned engines, but time and technology had refined that, and now with Nerv as a major technical think-tank, parallel advances had been made. Utilizing the latest in propulsion technology, dubbed repulsion by Shinji with his odd sense of humor, the engines didn't rely so much on explosive mass release to supply vectored lift, so much as shaped, even encapsulated force being released against not just air, but the released forces themselves.

Normal vectored thrust engines release explosive amounts of material, via shaped muzzles exhausts, to achieve thrust. Nerv's repulsor technology utilized that as a base, but improved on the forces released, themselves. By shaping the expelled material, usually by turbulence in the case of air or water, the pulses of released jets built up on one another, supplying superior translated thrust. Because the mass wasn't immediately loosing cohesion on exit, it allowed more concentrated, and therefore, focused use of the engines.

The battery of repulsors on each 'wing' were small, economical and took up the full structural mass of each, allowing at full power, for the C-Raiden to lift another mass of it's own equal. This was more of an assistant feature, of the command platform, than a tactical one. In the event of a retreat, the C-platform could retrieve, or even commandeer another combat unit. Remarkably efficient, these repulsors used charged-capillary pumps to eject native materials into shaped force, be it air, or water, and as such needed less energy to operate than any comparable thrust engines.

The head of the command platform was heavily armored, with a wide, long 'jaw' that actually housed the Raiden's only integrated weapon, a variation on the repulsor developed by the JSDF itself. Backward engineered, the shaped-force engine also allowed for charged particles and unconventional beam weaponry to be exponentially more effective, delivering payloads without dispersion loss, or setting up massive concussive impacts capable of bypassing armor and shattering internal structures with ease. Working off the principal that impacts set up resonance, essentially reactionary waves of force dispersion on a target, the timing of shaped-force impacts could be tuned so as to cause destructive, or constructive interference in those patterns. Due to it's mistakenly sonic nature, and the location of the mounted weapon, it was often referred to as the Banshee or Scream.

The results were devastating. Against a heavily armored foe, the weapon could simply bypass the external armor and deliver resonating concussive impacts to internal structures, essentially crushing it from the inside out. Against lightly armored foes, the effect was often more... messy. It's only limitation was firing speed, with a thirty second recharge under light load, and ten under critical state. The latter could only be used grounded and stabilized, with all non-operational power routed to the weapon.

Mana directed the Raiden out onto the flight yard, while all action around her ground to a halt. The great machine rarely saw the light of day, being constantly shipped, dismantled, revamped or tested as time went on. Unlike Nerv, the JSDF was perfectly capable of developing new weapon systems, and due to it's proximity to Nerv, had the leading edge on these innovations. That they had the dismantled JetAlone as well as the previous T-Raiden-T and Evangelions to use as inspiration, the C-Raiden platform was possibly one of the most elegant and functional weapons on earth.

More so, with every Evangelion unit that was not utterly annihilated either inert or locked into stasis, lacking pilots and support staff.

Raising it's wings, the Raiden seemed to stretch, casting about from one side to the other slowly, balancing on one leg then the other. Mana had not taken the machine out for a field run in ages, and it handled much differently than it's first incarnation. It felt alive. Cold, predatory and alive.

She loved it.

"Raiden, launch systems to 100 percent. We have a appointment we're late for," and in response, the machine hummed, with the whine of the banks of repulsors charging. It felt like her shoulders were full of lightning and fury. With a heady smirk, she set loose the thunder with barely a word: "Launch."

Those present, JSDF and JAF alike, looked to the beast, their daughter in it's belly, and knew that despite their failures against the Angels, despite the monsters that were the Evangelions, they had the final, upper hand. Their human work.

I O I

The Raiden, despite her stated aims, did not head directly for Germany, where the search for Shinji was already underway. As she approached Nerv, Mana was wondering what precisely she would find, when they did finally arrive there. A communication beam, tight band laser transmission, cut into her musings, "Pilot, communication from ground authority, high priority. 'Unidentified vessel, please transmit authority codes, you are in restricted, JAF protected airspace. Repeat, Uniden..."

"We come here every month for the barbecue, but they still don't know your name," she said with a sigh, gaining the mental impression of a confused look from her interface persona. "Nevermind. Transmit expected clearance, and open a emulation channel based off my personal communication network."

As she hovered, the background noise deadened, and she got a solid look at Nerv from above. The GeoFront was still relatively intact, after the reconstruction efforts and subsequent gutting and refit by the UN. Tokyo-3 was destroyed, most of the damage was done to the fortress structures themselves, but due to the limitations of maps, the area still carried that name. The literal impact of invading force that destroyed it, was that the top of the GeoFront was blown off. "This view never gets old," Mana muttered as her line of sight crested the broken lip of the cavernous phenomenon.

The Raiden's voice interrupted her sightseeing, "Communications interface complete." Focusing her view through tactical, she saw that the new reinforced plating above Nerv could be closed, resealing the GeoFront in the event of attack. The strategic necessity of this, being that inside this installation of Nerv, were the inert Evangelions. Not wanting a repeat of the devastation that was visited on the city in it's last incarnation, much of the industry and habitation had been relocated into the GeoFront itself, while above, minimal development had occurred. Water filtration, sun collection and transportation seemed to be the most prevalent, with a nearby airport and train hub. The nearby lake, Ashi, still had it's nearby springs and resort hotels, but it looked like a strained thing. The massive impact and detonation craters that deformed it's shores did not help that idea.

Not really a city, or even a place people would choose to live, Mana mused, not for the first time. Tokyo-3 was long gone, the upper city of her youth annihilated in the effort to reclaim the madness of Nerv. As she crossed into the city's airspace, passing into the Front itself, Mana looked down into the bustling city that was now Tokyo-3.

There had been proposals to name the city for it's origins again, Hakone, but the populace had become defensive of their home, and insisted that it remain as they knew it. No longer pretending to strive for the privilege of being Japan's new capital, the city lost much commerce, but with Nerv becoming a new superpower in a global market, that trend didn't continue. Below, she could clearly see her shadow crossing the various structures, as the sun behind her shone down into the cavern. "Connect me with Maya Ibuki." As lovely as the sights below her were, she had to remain on task, or little would be accomplished.

"Technical Division, Maya speaking."

Mana stifled a chuckle at the harried sound in the woman's voice. "I don't think your company lot can handle a Raiden, got someplace else for me to park?"

A moment of silence was her initial answer, but it was short lived. Mana realized the error in having a cell phone routed through her nervous system, when Maya exploded, "You WHAT? You brought that _thing_ here? Are you insane?"

Reacting to her mental state, the Raiden's posture stiffened, as it lazily circled the skyline. "Maya... are you going to let me park or continue to worry that this will get Nerv bad press, when honestly, having Shinji gone is way better for them to work with?"

"You're right," the woman agreed, and her voice reflected the sense of loss that was spreading through most of the young man's inner circle. "I'll open a hangar elevator, they should let you park and keep the Raiden out of general view."

She could see shortly, an armored panel light and start the alert sequence that would clear any bystander traffic. It wasn't in a central location, but off to her left some distance, so in the time she directed her Raiden to position, Mana had time to consider her intended course of action. "You think we're doing the right thing? Organizing so much manpower for this?"

In her mind, she could practically see the older woman tilting her head to consider the question. "I don't think it's a matter of right or wrong, for us." Mana made a small noise, an affirmative, and Maya continued, "It's more that we can't do otherwise. We have to."

"Funny how it works like that isn't it?"

Maya giggled slightly over the line, before her tone went somber again. "Yeah. And when we find him? I'm going to kill him. Running off to Germany without telling anyone!"

Snorting, Mana would have shaken her head, were her entire body not secured in it's restraints. "Take a number, line starts behind me."

The elevators were slow, moving down into the subsurface portion of the GeoFront, something Mana was vaguely thankful for. It gave her idle time, time to think. "Raiden, autistic mode." Autistic mode placed the command interface on an emergency only alert mode, where all data was routed through her HUD, rather than the more verbose method usually used. Letting her mind wander, she had to admit... something didn't feel right. Shinji's disappearance, the timing of their meeting to discuss the possibilities for saving his life. Could he have disagreed with it so much he walked into a trap, knowingly? Did someone else, some other player have some design on him? And why? If they wanted Nerv's secrets, the target should have been another. Raiden shivered with her, the great machine shifting slightly as the woman who's will it obeyed played out her fears.

Too soon, the lift halted, the sound like a thunderclap in the converted hangar bays. Still mostly empty space, the bays were used in situations like this, were large scale machinery had to be brought below into the working space of Nerv itself. Waiting for her was Maya and her own technical assistant, Mogami Aoi. "You really need a faster way into this place," her voice, amplified by the external speakers, echoed dully around the large space.

Maya looked up at the Raiden's 'face' and grinned, "Well, considering the main purpose was to get things from her to there fastest, we didn't really worry about bringing it back down so quick." Shrugging, she handed Aoi her ever present datapad and moved to the Raiden's side, running a hand along it's glossed armor. "Besides, recovery operations were usually very delicate. Slower was better."

Mana had to agree to the logic. She just didn't like it. "So, what's the status of our little project?"

"Well considering, I was hoping you could, well, get out of the walking megaphone so we can discuss it without half of Nerv hearing your side?" Her assistant giggled behind the datapad, raising it slightly to cover her face.

"Oh." Mana winced, willing the connective fibers that interfaced her to the Raiden to remain in active mode, still piercing her nervous system. Instead she detached the second stage connection bed, which contoured to her newer, more plugsuit style, dive suit. The Raiden lowered itself till it literally was leaning forward on it's lower jaw, back arched oddly to allow the pilot to exit. The upper half of the head seemed to break into three, the forward, reinforced bulkhead armor sliding slightly forward while the two lateral sections separated, a network of fibrous underarmor and locking mechanisms withdrawing into the armored shell to reveal her.

To Mana, still innately connected via the remote monitor in her helmet, the had the most disturbing sensation of her skull opening painlessly, then crawling out of it. "Forgive me for not dressing to impress, this thing isn't as wash and wear as your model."

The lead of Nerv Technical division waved her off, and murmured something to Mogami, causing the woman to bow slightly and go about some task, elsewhere. Walking up to where Mana stood, still leaning on the mech's opened canopy, she grinned let loose a relieved sigh. "Finally. Its odd, I always figured the higher up you went, the less you got watched. I should have remembered how much I stalked Sempai in those days."

"Picked up a little protege of your own then?" Mana teased, grinning, her head still half encased by the odd helmet. The visor's side units, the cameras that watched her eyes, were in turn protected by a lexan shield that dropped down to the woman's chin, giving her the look of someone who's face had been encased in a glass half bubble, her eyes behind opaque mechanical blinders. Her view was a somewhat confusing mix of her own perception, and that of the Raiden whom she was still intrinsically connected to. "So, what did you want to talk about, that had me coming out of the couch for?"

"I'm going with you."

If she hadn't been leaning against her vessel, Mana would have landed face-first on the hangar floor. "What? Are you mad? You're a noncombatant! If this is what I think it is, you're a walking casualty!"

Shaking her head, the young woman just looked up past her, toward where the Director's offices were, dark windows glaring balefully, a reminder of the first Ikari to dwell there. "No, I'm quite serious. You can't expect to take that on a global rescue and retrieval mission without someone to grease some gears for you. And my combat status is irrelevant, as I won't be playing at it. I'm going for logistics support."

"Maya," her voice cast low, the JSDF liaison sighed and regarded the other woman carefully. "I am Shinji's second in command. I'm not a lowly secretary."

"I know that, but you're also UN." Pointing to the Raiden, Maya made a gesture with her hand then, indicating the hangars and the space beyond. "We're Nerv. There may be some difficulty dealing with the foreign branches, who's ties aren't as friendly as ours."

She had to concede that point. Across the globe, the other Nerv branches were oversaw by a rather iron hand, often times they had cycled command staff in less than a year. That Nerv HQ in Japan had managed to stay somewhat stable, was an oddity. Regardless, the reasons were all thanks to the UN and their massive paranoia that the group would again build death machines. "I suppose I see your point," when the young scientist pumped her arm in a show if victory, Mana held up a hand, "Ah, ah no. I'm not done yet.

"Think, I know that huge brain of yours isn't broken." Maya huffed and her hands slid to her hips, indignation plain on her face. Mana continued, "Shinji's already gone. I'm going, and if you go too, what does that leave Nerv HQ with? I hate to say it, but we can't leave Kodama here on her own."

"I can't agree more. Where do I sit?"

The other two women jumped, having not heard the eldest Horaki move to stand beside the weapon's other flank, where she'd been listening in. Reflex nearly killed her, when Mana's surprise had the Raiden shift quickly, reacting to the pilot's impulses. Kodama stood, staring at the mech as it's foot, the three plates that made it's contact surface, slowly bloomed back into a semblance of something other than a multi-ton hammer that had nearly ended her. "Goddamn it 'Dama," Maya's hand dropped to her chest, as her breathing leveled off, while Mana's hands clenched and unclenched, wanting nothing more than to take off the helmet and rub at her temples.

Swallowing, the woman looked to Mana and shrugged, "Seemed rude to interrupt."

"Don't sneak up on a really big, really dangerous mech and say "Boo", mkay? Just a tip, for the future." Still shaking slightly as her contact system was the one that had nearly killed one of her friends, the young woman gratefully leaned on the cool armor of the Raiden, shaking her head. "And no, seriously. No."

Her face immediately going stern, the lead Medical officer stomped around to Maya's side and regarded the suited pilot steadily. "He could be hurt. I know the most about not only him and his medical history, but how best Nerv systems could be used to help. You need me."

"I need an asprin," was Mana's only reply, as she threw up her hands and looked around. "Anyone else? While I'm sitting here waiting?"

No one stepped forward, but any staff that could be seen, were shooting Maya and Kodama dirty looks, ones that said quite clearly, "Lucky bitch."

"Good." Rounding back on her closest friends and partners in this charade at Nerv, Mana narrowed her eyes, not that they could see. It was fine, her posture exuded enough threat to easily make up for the lack, "As for you two, listen up.

"There are no passenger seats in this. I will be going really, really fast, once I get to leave," that last was hissed as a recrimination at Maya, who only shrugged, "and there is no way you can keep up with me, in a civilian craft." Leaning back, she regarded the two women with her head tilted. "So how, then, do you expect to go with me?"

Maya smirked, and pointed to a small, almost nondescript cargo contained with what looked to be a stress-bearing upper brace. Mana blinked a moment. "Why does that look like a happy meal?"

Maya's smirk faded. "It's a personnel module your damn junker can carry, you, you... argh!" She reached into a pocket and yanked out a small remote, savagely jabbing at a button until her expression softened, her anger fading. Distantly, the two heard something explode, repeatedly. "As I was saying. It's a reinforced personnel and armament module that the Raiden can use for long distance engagements. There's enough room for a limited medical bay, which I've installed, or for the unit to store soft mount armaments. It was going to be your birthday present."

Blinking, Mana looked from the remote, to the 'happy meal' and back to Maya. "But why does it look like a happy mea-"

"Shut. _Up_." The remote creaked under the strain of it's chassis, and the savage pushing it's single button was getting. Distantly, the other two could hear something getting blown up. More.

Kodama moved slowly from the stressed Tech division head to Mana, as the two stood watching. "Do you know?"

"No. Nor do I think it safe to wonder," sighing in defeat, knowing well she couldn't dissuade the two if she wanted to, Mana gestured over to the... thing, and noticed it did have the proper dimensions on the upper brace for one of her Raiden's feet to carry it. Her brow furrowed. Without manipulation arms, the unit did have limitations, as it's frame was not designed for very many configurations. But she never thought... "Alright," She said, suppressing a smirk. "You girls, I assume, have all you need?" Seeing both nod to one another, they moved back as Mana swung back into the Raiden's control web. "Good, now, go be good and climb into the purse, I'm going to start the car."

"It's not a purse!" Maya shrieked, as Kodama backed away, the scientist seemed intent on glaring through the armor of the Raiden by force of will alone. As suddenly as her tirade begin, it ended, and she turned to the doctor with a smile. "Well, lets go get Shinji back then, yeah?"

Kodama moved a bit faster, climbing into the... purse.

I O I

Mana had figured that the PMB, portable module bay as Maya insisted, was not something she could have Raiden carry in a land configuration. She only had two legs. Shrugging, they collected the needed material and loaded it into the bay, as Mana reconnected her suit and the phase-2 connection brace back into the couch, sighing as her senses were flooded with a less indistinct awareness of the Raiden again. "Let me know when you two are ready," she announced over the speakers, settling back into a brief preflight check of the systems.

The comm's window normally used for military communication blinked into her awareness, as Maya's face looked back at her, "We may need you to do some more... tactical field adjustments, than the Banshee can manage," when Mana favored her with an impression of a raised brow, her digital avatar doing the same, Maya's eye twitched. "There are guns. Over there. Pick them up."

"Why didn't you just say so," shaking her head, Mana saw that the Maya was glaring again. "What? Really would that be so hard?"

"We're still prohibited from making weapons," she hissed back, securing the last few loose items into suspension webs inside the modular bay. "I knew you'd not get clearance to take modules that were munition based, for a civilian recovery mission, no matter who it was, so I had specs for your usual ones... improved, and fabricated here."

Mana's ears perked at this. "Improved? I love it when that big, sexy brain of yours gets creative, so tell me what you brought me from the store." As the camera showed the two settling into a pair of heavy G hammocks, web based suspension systems that would support them in the bay, Mana had to smile. Her friend really was a genius, and if anything, she was grateful they'd be coming, even if it meant that something horrible happening would cripple this branch of Nerv.

Checking her coworkers suspension web, Maya nodded and patted her on the shoulder. Kodama looked none to happy to be essentially tied up in a hammock and left there, but knew if this was Maya's doing, it was likely needed. "The smaller, more streamlined module is a supplementary, high velocity munitions system." Settling into her own web, the woman secured it with practiced ease. Mana's brow rose, at the implications.

"Soo..." deciding to forego the far too easy bondage jibe at the woman's expense, she instead secured the module to her unit's 'forearm' softmount. Data from the weapon's internal system supplemented her HUD, and she gaped openly. "How the hell?"

"Yeah, it's a cyclic, chambered railgun," giggling, the tech grinned up at the camera, mounted in the module bay. "I never liked the limited charge time on those. Always wondered why no one thought to use a rotary chamber, so the main firing magnetos could cool and recharge more efficiently."

Mana's HUD showed her an expanded view, how the weapon functioned. The chambers built charge on a cycle, based off it's rate of fire, so each would be at full capacity when reaching the 'barrel' for their turn. Ammunition was an expressed liquid metal, that the particular field form Maya had designed forced into a temporary crystal form. This was to defeat the phase state shift of potential energy at high velocities, which would vaporize normal metal fluids, and allow tighter aim. Additionally the liquid munition was space and waste saving – no cases, no dead airspace between slugs. It was simple, elegant... and so much overkill it was frightening. "Uhm. Wow."

Maya just grinned up at her. "I hid the developmental cost for it, by requisitioning funds for hammers."

"... You're kidding." The technician's grin told her otherwise. "You're not kidding."

Shaking off her bemusement, the pilot found the next module less daunting. "Ah, good old anti-personnel weapons," she purred, racking the module onto her left forearm mount. "You really know how to take a girl on the town," she winked at Maya, over her display. The tech blushed furiously, looking away, only making Mana laugh louder. Her HUD reported that fire control on the weapon was synchronizing, and she grinned as the Raiden reported the 20mm twin M61 Vulcan Cannons online.

The Raiden moved back to the lift, after lifting and depositing the module bay there in an impressive show of balance and coordination. To her credit, it wasn't a difficult maneuver, but the fact the bay held two of her friends made Mana extra careful. Something ticked at the back of her mind, as the warning klaxons sounded, alerting nearby staff of the elevators impending activation. "Hey, Maya?"

Inside the bay, it's camera blinked on as the brunette looked up, "Yes?"

"Just out of curiosity, why are there alarms around the elevator going off?"

Maya's brow furrowed a moment, before she closed her eyes hard and screamed, "Brace for launch!"

To her credit, Mana was coming to the same conclusion. This did not mean, however, that she was prepared for the rapid acceleration that pushed her mech literally onto the floor of the lift. "Sonofa-"

And then, the pressure was gone, and she blinked as her HUD went into hysterics, range, altitude alarms all sounding at once. "Ohshi-" Worse, there beside her and falling, was the module bay. Foregoing verbal commands, she dove further into to the uplink system, letting the impulse transduction of the interface translate her will to command.

Above the rebuilt Tokyo-3, those out at their lunch times were witness to something that many never thought to see again. Those veterans of the Angel Wars knew the klaxon warnings of an Eva launch well enough to instinctively scan the skies, and then look for the exit point. Others merely looked on, confused and worried. With little warning, the sky was host to an odd shaped device, and a large cargo crate, which of course seemed to relax some, fearing to see an Eva once again amongst them.

Relief turned to panic, as the objects hit the apogee of their flight, and began the fall back to earth. Almost immediately the larger of the two objects righted itself, amid a massive scream of released power.

"Target impact – five seconds," the HUD told her.

Raiden's engine pods angled, flared, and it was stooping like a falcon toward a sparrow. "Maya, hang on!"

"Four seconds."

Velocity warnings spread across her line of sight, and her lips thinned.

"Three seconds."

Inside the bay, she caught a glimpse, little more than a flash, of Kodama mumbling frantically, her eyes squeezed shut.

"Two seconds."

Mana gritted her teeth, swinging out one of the Raiden's massive legs, hooking the reinforced load bar in it's grasp. As it made contact, she inverted the pylons and moaned quietly as the forces translated through the command interface and she felt like her shoulder blades were being torn from her back. Not enough, she thought, strangely calm as the ground swept at her in a dizzying blur. She blinked, and-

To those that watched, there was nothing quite like what was happening. The Evangelions were majestic, horrible and grand all at once. Giants, humanoid and fierce. Many felt them too much so, their likeness too close to man to bear. This, then, was like watching an air show, but with much more dire consequence. The craft, for none knew what it was, tumbled, then dove impossibly fast toward the falling container, as it lazily spun toward the ground. Below was little more than a park, a memorial set up by Nerv in honor of those who were considered war heroes.

Toward the statue of Rei Ayanami, the massive thing tumbled. Behind it, the craft sped, until at the last moment it caught the thing in a powerful claw, but the speed it was going almost guaranteed it would soon be impacting with crushing force.

Raiden's remaining leg shot out, and as the craft banked and seemed to weave in it's frenzied attempt to stop, it rolled. That leg that stretched out and kicked viciously at the ground, sending gouts of earth up into the sky, missing the monuments to the fallen by yards. The impact shook the nearby buildings so mightily, that a few windows cracked. Instead of slamming into the ground, the machine flipped onto it's back and swept, perhaps scant inches, from the turf as it's cargo was held aloft, almost triumphantly. It's impossible maneuver had bled off enough of the forward velocity into spin, to let the craft level it's steep brake, and let the strange vessel sweep along the ground for nearly a kilometer before rising, skimming the outlying skyline of the industrial park and setting windows rattling for blocks.

Clear of the GeoFront and settling her cargo by lake Ashi, Mana landed and stumbled, the Raiden having sustained structural damage in it's mad maneuver. Shortly, the mech settled into the water and she let it submerse down till only the command web and couch were accessible by land, even then needing her to wade out. The Raiden would take on water, and the reactive mass of the ballast paste would effect repairs to the machine, over the next hour.

She'd foregone wearing the phase-2 interface this time, and laid on the sand, her back a series of angry welts as Kodama tended to her with a small gauze pad. "You should let me at least put a dressing-"

"No, you can't," behind them, Maya was wiping her mouth clean, after emptying her stomach onto the sand. Still shaking off the effects of the impromptu launch, the woman shook, "If you bandage her back, it would cause the suit to misalign, or the needles the Raiden uses to insert incorrectly. She's used to this. Let it go, 'Dama."

Nodding, Mana stretched her back and let the urge to wince just wash, like the water that lapped at her mech. "I'll be fine. I go in for testing each second week, and spend a day interfaced. I've been doing this, even more so when I was younger, since I was ten. I'm fine." Kodama sighed and sat back, looking to Maya and her pale face. "Leave Maya alone," the pilot growled, her eyes still cast to the lake.

Kodama started, her expression going sour. "Fine, I'll just let you two suffer, and go read my novel then." So saying, she did just that, as Maya laughed to herself weakly.

Crossing to sit by the auburn haired pilot, Maya leaned back, watching the sky. "Thanks, she's... not a bad person. She just has a tendency to... well smother people."

They looked out over the lake, as the cicadas droned. Silence crept on, as the two sat, the sun falling slowly as the afternoon began. "She lost her mother. Her sister was the one to take care of them, for a while. I guess when Hikari left for college..." Maya shrugged, watching the clouds move slowly overhead.

Taking a breath, Mana turned her head, watching the technician's eyes search the sky. "I guess that's why, really. It makes sense at least."

"Hm?"

"Shinji." Turning her gaze back to the lake, she continued, after a moment. "Why so many follow him. I know he's not such a leader as his father. His mind is sharp, true. I think it has more to do with how... people here, so many, needed someone to look to. A hero.

"In the end, Evangelion gave them one, but it wasn't the machines, but him." Taking a breath, she let it free slowly, her mind wandering, trailing words. "People looked to him. That's why he's so respected. It's not something he sees, still. Shinji just is, in his mind." Sighing, she looked to the watch on her wrist, weary of laying in the sun. It only reminded her that there were things to do. The world was moving, the sun overhead in it's great cycle. There were things to do, she could not rest. Not yet.

Her watch beeped, once, shrilly. "It's time."

I O I

"I expect results. This does not give me faith in your abilities. I needed information from within Nerv, and you bring me a powerless figurehead."

Claus Braun stared at the man before his bivouac and narrowed his eyes. His boot scraped slowly off the desk, till it fell with a thump to the ground, as he straitened from his reclining posture, eyes hard. "You can't expect me to have contacts that deep into Nerv. My network is here. Don't throw around unacceptable expectations, and you won't be disappointed." Leaning forward, the man seated at the desk ground out his cigarette, flicking the butt into the wastebasket. "You want intel there? Get intel there. You designated a target. I acquired it. This is not a complex situation."

Outside, as much as there was an outside to this place, men seemed to go still, straiten. Here, there was danger, they knew. These were hardened, battle-worn and warchasing soldiers. PMC troops, they were not in the military for honor, the ideals of a country. Soldiers who went to war, for the sake of war. And here, between these two men, was danger.

"You are right, of course." The other man, not wearing the colors of Braun's PMC smiled, bowing slightly to the man behind the desk. "And the prisoner?"

"You have my report, Scott. He's dying, and there's little we can do about it."

At the mention of the man's name, the man standing by the desk seemed to tense. "Mind your tongue, and what you say."

Claus raised a brow. "Scott. Brandon Scott. What?" Laughing, the man slammed his hand onto the table, rattling the glass and ashtray there. "The famous, failed Eva pilot from the US." He gestured about the camp, at the people that were going out heir business. "No one cares." Turning, the man pulled a folio from a brief case and set it on the table. "Take it. I'm tired of this drama you seem intent on. Take your prize, and I'll have my men, or you can have your men – I don't care, escort you out of the compound. I grow weary of this."

Scott regarded the man levelly, eyes never leaving his face. After a full minute of such scrutiny, the young man picked up the folder, and turned, walking slowly and without affectation beyond Claus's sight. "Tch. Why did I take this contract." Taking a breath, the man leaned back and regarded the sky, from below the canopy of his tent.

Brandon Scott... disturbing young man, he reasoned. What his intelligence had provided, before they had agreed to the contract, was little to be concerned over for his organization. His danger, was that he was a very rich, very bored and very petty young man.

His reputation in the US was likened to a hero, before incidents in 2014, and the Ohio Vanishing. After that, the government couldn't wash it's hands of him fast enough. No one wanted to be involved with the organization or anything else that had literally wiped miles and hundreds of people from the fabric of existence. Scott had his own family and fortune to fall back on, being the son of a well-seated UN representative, but after the Nerv branch incident, bad luck seemed to tail the young man.

A month later, his father was killed, leaving him an orphan. His mother had been missing for months, supposedly a ransom case that just never was resolved. Having been anything but an independent young man, the youth of course spent preposterous amounts of his family's fortune on trivialities, before he learned of the local west coast PMC. Having been shunned by the military and Nerv, he used his funds to secure a position as liaison with the PMC, and from there established a small, personal unit that had never seen combat, but were some of the most well geared private sector soldiers available.

Their first contract had gone surprisingly well. No wonder, as the young man literally bought off the opposing force. He snorted at the memory, knowing full well details that were lost to most. The main reason for this, was that that company was his own, under a lieutenant's leadership. Claus could likely trace the man's contact with his current company back to that incident. His current PMC was, Liber Noctis, a splinter from that group that formed from that engagement.

Claus, at heart a mercenary, didn't consider the principals for his original hire. Brandon payed better. Therefore, his cause was more worthwhile. They had packed up and moved on, without word or notice to the local warlord who had hired them, and heard later of the massacre of the man's forces to a blanket bombing that occurred shortly after.

Sloppy. Excessive. Amateurish. He sniffed derisively. These days, Braun would have shot the man for such lousy example of company command, out of principal. Much less for trying to buy him off, now that he knew how the American's PMC functioned.

Dangerous wasn't a word he'd waste on the young man, but enough money in foolish hands, was never a safe thing.

It was with this thought that Claus Braun noticed his watch captain rushing up to him, gesturing to the west frantically. "Problems, we have an inbound airship."

Raising a brow, the man stood and took the binoculars the watch captain offered. A view of the horizon presented itself, but he couldn't spot the supposed intruder. "Location?"

"West by southwest, bearing north, last estimate was closing at high speed, but would pass over five miles away." The man's tone seemed to relay his anxiety at telling his commander this. As expected, Claus favored him with a raised brow, at his continuing vagueness. "Sorry sir, you just need to see for yourself."

Nodding, he raised the glasses and scanned again. His brow rose as something in his chest went cold. "I... see. Yes. You wouldn't know what that is.

"General quarters, and make it quiet," he said evenly, and before the captain could get far, he grabbed him by the collar, hauling him back. Hissing his words into the man's ear, he added to his previous order, "and put that fool American under guard. I think I know what they're after, and if they come anywhere near us, we need to be ready."

Boggling at his commanders duplicity, the PMC soldier regardless snapped a salute. "Sir, what is that?"

"As far as I know, a myth. You have your orders, go." The man hurried off, while Claus tracked the somewhat random flight pattern of the odd airship. "What are you doing in Germany, little fly? Come to collect your missing prince? I wonder..."

As he watched, the gunship moved closer, it's scanning having likely picked up the camp either by infrared, or simply the irregularity of their encampment. He'd had no reason to expect or fear an airborne search, and following suit, the damned American had brought him bad luck.

"A JAF prototype gunship. Unbelievable."

* * *

A/N: Wordy and technical. Yep, Mana-centric chapter. Establishing the tech level, her machine, and the world that 3I left behind. Some material referecing Rebuild rather than the original material. I just like it better.


	3. Chapter 3

**Heroes of Evangelion**

**An Iron Will**

I O I

Shinji looked out at the world he knew, the one his recent mind could recall. I was an amber void, devoid of detail, smelling of blood and tasting of the same. His heartbeat, the working of his lungs were the only things that broke that monotony. He tried, a long while ago it seemed, to count the time that passed in breaths, but without some way to tally them, his mind failed eventually.

A lifetime ago, it felt like, he'd been here. Friendly faces outside, worrying over him.

"Mana," the words bubbled out of his lips, the LCL unable to absorb carbon dioxide as efficiently as oxygen. His body was locked into this place, something keeping him from moving, from feeling and sometimes it seemed, sleeping.

His concept of time was broken beyond understanding, but he had the urge to think of each solidly lucid period as a day. His nights were the incoherent madness of his waking dreams, all played out on an amber screen.

Today, then, was to be a different day. A shock went through him, as something changed in his world, the void seeming to shutter and shift before him. It was clearing, it seemed. What he'd taken for a depthless orange void was really just LCL, fogged evenly with something suspended in it, giving it the illusion of distance.

As the LCL cleaned and cleared in a fast swirl of vertigo, he saw them. Faces outside of the glass, looking in at him. He knew them, all of them, and his aching, sensation deprived mind screamed as those memories flashed forward, breaking the torpid shell his psyche had made to protect him.

He tried to reach forward, willing his hand to move. Surprisingly it did, as before it wouldn't heed him. Slowly, he dragged his arm through the dense fluid, stretching his fingers out till tendons screamed at him.

She laid her hand on the glass, where his fingers barely brushed. "Mana," he whispered again, the bubbles from his words carrying them off, up and away from him.

On the other side of the glass wall, she mouthed a word, and it took him a long time to understand but when he did, it almost immediately settled him into a content slumber.

"Soon," she said, tears quietly running down her cheeks. "Soon."

I O I

Content Shinji was, but his dreams, driven by a mind long separated from the reality that had occurred, would not be still. Dreams of what brought him to be suspended inside a NP tank, and all those faces outside, to him.

I O I

She worked hard. It was something natural to her, and in this, she was comfortable. Few things broke through her shell these days, so long after the nightmare that was Tokyo-3, but failure, utter and indiscriminate did so admirably. "God damn it!"

Her patient – Shinji, a small nagging voice insisted over her training to impartiality, was recovering as well as could be expected. Rocket impacts had nearly destroyed his armored convoy, and lucky for him, shielded his body from the bulk of shrapnel and debris. The initial worry she had, at his slow recovery, was that perhaps she'd missed something. More intensive scans, those she could do with limited equipment, told another story. "Shinji... what happened to you?" A damp towel, cooler than the air was laid along his forehead. "What's happened to both of us..."

Last week, she would have laughed, had someone told her today would be as it had happened. Comfortably studying at the new Genome and Evolutionary Archive, Hikari was well on her way to finding herself accepted as a researcher at Nerv. She'd entertained the idea of staying in Germany to work, but... certain things had dissuaded her.

Though she'd never truly been close to her sister Kodama, she still valued her family. With Nozomi soon starting college as well, she knew that her father would be lonely, and knew she had to go back for him. Of all the Horaki sisters, Hikari was the most sensitive to the emotions of others. Kodama was brilliant, a medical genius, where she was simply capable. It rankled her a bit, but it was more her competitive side talking. Hikari was truly happy for her sister's successes.

One week ago, and it had all went to hell. An advertisement. Cursing her curiosity again, she worried at the stitches she'd worked on, replacing coarser, heavy lacing with finer ones, trying to minimize the scarring. The article had mentioned how the local college was closely aligned with the PMC registry through the German military, and as such, acknowledged time spent as a field nurse as credit in practical studies.

She'd felt it a decent opportunity. The local PMC's were UN organized and sanctioned, not the rough mercenaries she'd feared. A little research left her confidant that the situation would be little more than a month studying her books, dispensing band-aids for marching callouses.

How wrong she was, stunned her. The worst of it was that it was her own error that saw her in this place. "What do you think, Shinji? Up for listening to a story?

"It was a dark... well, just dark really," laughing quietly, she rinsed a cloth, the water staining red in the rusty field sink. "And yours truly had a bit too much to drink at a party thrown by a friend of yours.

"Turns out, you really shouldn't sign contract forms when under the influence," she muttered, shaking her head slowly. "I woke up at the UN hospice, apparently just having thought to lay down, after my massive mistake. The irony of it it... the PMC I signed on with wasn't even on the list for credit." Oh she'd tried to explain that to Braun. He'd simply showed her the pit behind the bivouac and grinned that predator's smile at her. She shuddered, at the memory. "I've seen war and death, thanks to the Angels. But it always us, versus them. I hate this. All the people that get hurt..."

Hikari slumped, her hand resting along her temple, rubbing gently. "Stuck here a month. Had two weeks left when suddenly they mobilized. I've never been in a war camp before, it's... scary. So many people, all so heavily armed. All killers. I'm so afraid here," her breath catching, she turned away, as if Shinji watched her. She wouldn't cry. Not for this. Not over them. "They're as bad as I thought, but... it's my fault I'm here. I have to endure.

"Then they bring me you, and I make the massive mistake of letting them know that I knew you, back in the Wars." Shaking her head slowly, the young woman heaved a sigh. "And now they know. I didn't think they did, with how they treated you. Just some Nerv exec, right? It may have been better had that stayed true. No... I told them. Let them know who you were, and now..." her breath hitched a bit, and she controlled herself with a few moments of effort. "Maybe it would be better if we didn't walk out of here," the finished, her voice cast as if she knew someone was listening.

Unfortunately for her, someone was. "Isn't that a conflict to your oath as a healer, Miss Horaki?"

The sudden noise had her jumping up, and it nearly upset the tray of tools and material on the table where she worked. Her fear was evident, but she still looked up to the PMC commander with open hostility when she spoke, "Announce yourself in a medical ward! Surprising me in a delicate operation could be deadly," her energy waning, in the face of his immovable expression, she sat heavily.

Shaking his head slowly, commander Braun looked over his captive... captives, he amended, knowing well the girl had no illusions at this point. The boy looked worse than yesterday, and this bent a frown onto his features. "I find myself currently more concerned with you becoming an angel of death, than making a misstroke in surgery," the accusatory tone had her flushing angrily, but he knew it was the truth. She was a veteran of the Angel Wars, if not a combatant then one of the few survivors. Worse, she was of that annoyingly moral type, that if bent too far, would snap rigid into the mold of heroes. He'd seen it too often, on the battlefield, and the peculiar combination here was beginning to concern him.

The girl, already with a penchant for saving lives. Both of these youths lived through a war that had caused more collateral destruction than he could imagine. She obviously had some emotional connection to him, which was compounded by his condition. That in itself could prove bothersome, as a dying hero is likely the most dangerous thing on earth. "Perhaps I should limit your... schedule. I feel you are becoming stressed, Miss Horaki."

Reactions, first gut ones, told him much about the people he was around. Atrocity, knowledge and psychological warfare had given him a specific talent for striking blows upon the mind that would ring through a person's personality, showing him the true tone of their soul. The terror and anxiety at the idea of being separated from her hero, was clear enough for him to see.

"Y-you can't! He'll die!" Backing up so she stood between Shinji and the room, Hikari cast about as if to defend him, and herself.

Claus held up a stilling hand, "Easy. You merely concern me, with your wild mood swings. That cannot be healthy, for your patients, agreed?" When she made no sign of relaxing, he tried another tactic. "Do you remember the fate of the last doctor, to refuse one of my orders?" A visible shudder ran through her, and her legs seemed to weaken beneath her. "Good. Keep that image in mind, before you do something foolish." Rising, he noticed her instinctive shuffle away. Schooling his expression, he smiled brightly, "You would never make it a mile, in these wilds. You are my creature, until I release you. Don't forget this." Turning, he left her to contemplate those words, and her role in this game.

When the door closed, she let her legs give out and slumped to the ground, sobbing uncontrollably. "Why, why is this happening? I worked so hard, I was a good girl! I was a good girl..." She was so wrapped up in her grief and fear, she nearly missed the light touch of a hand on her shoulder, except for the familiar squeeze it gave her, almost too weak to feel.

"You... are good..." his words snapped her attention to the man on the table, and she gasped, as she looked back into Shinji's eyes.

Jumping back to her feet, her worry and fear for the moment forgotten, Hikari leaned over him, her face a portrait of relief, "Shinji, my god when did you wake up?"

He simply shook his head, and smiled apologetically, his mouth working silently. With a slight shock she realized he likely was at his limit with those words, and tried to help him with some water, her hands shaking like autumn leaves. A few minutes of letting him clumsily drink, and she allowed herself to relax into the chair beside his makeshift cot. The fact of awareness brought to mind her earlier story, and she blushed crimson in the low light, "How much did you hear?"

Straining slightly, Shinji coughed and motioned for Hikari to stay, that he was alright. "Sorry. But... enough. Who's party was it?" His voice was weak, but Shinji didn't mind so much. It was better here, awake and seeing someone familiar than that awful nightmare dreamscape he'd been in before.

Chuckling slightly, Hikari looked away, still intensely uncomfortable about the topic despite it being years in the past. "Oh, Asuka's birthday, actually. She liked the earrings you sent by the way." From the corner of her vision, Hikari could see his expression fall, his posture weakening. It wasn't so much that she didn't like Asuka... she just didn't like what the woman did. It seemed every action was meant as a threat or boast, another move on a chessboard only she could see. Then there was the way she spoke about Shinji, how she had treated him back when they were still in school. Sure, she was a child – Hikari had her own childish moments. But...

Laying back, Shinji considered what Hikari had said, his mind cast back to the previous month. "I... hah. Tell you a secret." This pulled Hikari from her introspection, and she blinked curiously at the man, as he smiled, eyes closed. She made a small noise for him to continue, and Shinji laughed mirthlessly for a moment. "I didn't send her those."

"What?" She was slightly shocked at that admission, but the implications were too intriguing to just ignore. "Who sent it then?"

"Mana. She reminded me that her birthday was the next day, and... well, after our last round of arguing, I had no interest in it." Smiling sadly, he considered the room, his eyes finally clearing enough for him to see it well. "Sad, isn't it."

Shaking her head quickly, Hikari replaced the cloth on his forehead, the best she could do to help him be comfortable other than another does of heavy drugs. "No, not at all. 'Dama has me buying gifts for her all the time."

"Kodama?" At her nod, he chuckled weakly. "She's a very bright woman." When Hikari tensed, he blinked up at her, eyes widening slightly as he realized why, "Oh, I'm sorry -"

"Don't be. She's always been the prodigal of our family," She reassured him, but still it stung. It seemed she would always be that middle girl, even to Shinji. A small part of her wanted to laugh at that, given their circumstances. He was probably just trying to be nice, complement your family, a scolding voice inside her accused, as she fought off the fit of jealousy her sister's successes always seemed to rouse in her. It was a show of how thin her nerves were worn, that she showed it here, now. "How do you know her?"

"She's... well." Grunting in pain, he forced himself up to a sitting position, much to her horror.

Her hands were cold on his skin, he noted, as she tried to gently force him back onto the cot. "Lay down! You can't be moving so much with your stitches."

"It's OK." Shaking his head, he met her eyes, and Hikari swallowed slowly. Reluctantly her hands dropped and she settled back to her chair with an almost imperceptible nod. "Kodama... is one of my technicians in Japan. I work with her, more or less daily."

She felt like smacking her forehead in annoyance. Of course he worked with her – there was only one Nerv facility in Japan. "I'm sorry, this place..." He waved off her apology and leaned back on the wall, satisfied and panting slightly. "Why are you here, Shinji?"

"I was under the assumption I got blown up."

Hikari blinked at him, then laughed, shaking her head slowly, "Always the stooge."

"Always," he replied, but his expression sobered almost immediately. "I... had something I wanted to tell Asuka. I wanted to do it in person, despite our differences."

Tell her that you're dying, tell her... whatever it is that would put you at ease, she added silently. Of all their schoolmates, those that spend time with the pilots, she'd been the most personally involved yet separate. She'd seen Ayanami, so long injured almost as soon as she began school, go from a distant, cold young woman to a simply quiet and enigmatic person. Watched as she slowly opened up to Shinji, and he in turn to her. They were good for each other, she remembered. There was a distinct possibility in her mind at least, that they'd have become a couple. As far as Shinji, she'd watched as he was one day the target for Touji's rage, then almost overnight his closest friend. Seen as he alternately opened up to Rei, and shielded himself even further from Asuka, despite how hard he worked to defend her as well. Asuka was her own bundle of issues... one Hikari was preternaturally aware of. Of all the pilots, she was most familiar and confused by the German girl.

She supposed the thing that bothered her most about the young woman was that she refused to talk with Hikari about the truth of her issues. Oh she'd rant on and on about the various faults in everything around her – from her guardian Misato to her roommate, to Nerv and the school, yet never did she really talk about what really was on her mind. It was always that smokescreen. Hikari had moments of not knowing whether to be insulted that Asuka thought so little of her that she'd believe those were all there was, to comforted that girl would even open up to her at all. After all... she was the pilot's only real friend, as far as those went.

As for Shinji... she wagered he knew about his failing health. It was something he'd do, find Asuka and clear the air, once and for all, before he... died.

"I don't know if she'd really deal with it well," was her only reply, her mind playing over their collected past as she considered the impact on not only Shinji but Asuka of such news.

To her surprise, he laughed at this. "You're right, you know. Without me there to compete with," shaking his head, he went silent.

An uncomfortable silence stretched out between them, as Hikari worked silently to clean his wounds, washing and rinsing old blood away as she worked. It was that silence that let them hear the sound of footsteps. "Someone..."

"Go stand by the tools Hikari." She started at the sudden coldness in his tone, and did so, her anxiety obvious.

Brandon Scott swept into the room, his two attendants leveling their guns at the other occupants while the young man grinned at them. "Well, looks like our little hero is awake." Stepping over quickly, he snapped out a hand and pulled Shinji's chin up hard, causing the former pilot to wince.

"Stop it, he's-" the clack of rounds being chambered and safeties unlocked stilled her, as Hikari's words died in her throat. She could see him motioning her down from the corner of her eye, as well as that horrid grin on Scott's face.

Shinji straitened his back, turning his face from the other man's grasp. "A ransom at this point is pretty useless, you know," Shinji muttered, refusing to so much as sigh in front of his captor, now that he was awake. Oddly, having Hikari there gave him some steadiness in dealing with the unknown man. "All the relevant parties-"

"Know you're dying? Yes, I figured." Glaring down at the pilot, Scott laughed once, mirthlessly. "So much I've heard. All so... disappointing, really." Turning, the man motioned to the troops and they closed in on the room's occupants. "No matter. Move them, we're leaving."

The troops moved forward, and the first was at Shinji's side before those words sank in to her shocked mind. "What? What do you mean move? He's barely alive, are you stupid?"  
Scott moved with surprising speed, Shinji noted, doing his best to stand as the soldier helped him. He watched as the man simply snapped to where Hikari was, and then the pistol was at her temple. "Leave her alone or I'll conveniently fall and kill myself on a shoelace or something. I assume all this trouble was to get me alive, or I'd be dead by now."

"Holding yourself hostage? What makes you think I can't drug you and just have you moved?" Scott didn't move the gun though, and Hikari was not handling it well. Her knees shook, and her vision was a mess, as she hiccuped back tears that she couldn't afford.

The former pilot managed a small smile. "Because, I would be, if you could. Leave her alone. I'll cooperate. She's a lousy nurse anyway."

You never were a good liar, Shinji, she thought as the man pressed the muzzle of the firearm against her skull once, hard, before moving away. Reaching up to rub at the sore place the pistol had left on her scalp, she was lifted painfully to her feet by the other soldier, startling a yelp from her. Stumbling after the pilot, she looked at the men and shivered, "What do you plan to do?"

The American shot her a contemptuous glare, before motioning down the hallway. "Get them moving, we need to be away. Now."

Shinji slowed, shaking his head, "You don't need her." Again he was surprised, as Scott's pistol butt connected with his lower jaw, the sound of cracking bone loud in the room. Hikari made to move to his side, but one of the troops jabbed her in the ribs with the rifle he carried, motioning to the door. The other hauled the wavering man along, as Scott moved quickly out to the waiting sun.

More orders were given, as they were shuffled about to a troop carrier. Shinji was laid out on the back, a guard at the rear door as they moved on, making more arrangements. Shortly, the convoy was mobile, and the noise loud enough to make the loosened teeth in Shinji's mouth rattle painfully in his skull.

"Hikari?" Leaning close, the young woman made a show of inspecting his wounds, nodding as he raised a brow, acknowledging she heard him. He waited a moment, but the jarring ride didn't make it easy to collect his thoughts, around the pain. "You know... these men. You're a hostage too."

"I know."

"These people... they don't take hostages."

She looked away, nodding. "Yeah."

She felt his hand on hers, something cold and hard in it. Looking down she saw a vial, taken from the room, a simple thing... but effective in large doses. "When the time comes, can you do it? Be what he said?"

It took her a moment to catch his meaning, but when it came she looked away, toward the guard and the rapidly retreating forms of the PMC camp behind them. Could she, if what he feared came to pass? She knew... if they were escaping the harsh commander of Liber Noctis, this could only mean that things were going to get worse. How far down the rabbit hole were they? Worse... torture and death, slow and painful, a voice told her, and she shivered. But despite it all... could she be what he wanted?

"Please, not after everything else. They want something, and it's almost a guarantee that whatever it is, will hurt people I care about. Will hurt you too." Closing his eyes, he laid back and let loose a deep breath. "Don't let me die knowing that's what I left behind."

Hikari nodded, her eyes stinging. She knew, deep down, that when Shinji died, the only thing waiting for her was a short interrogation on anything he may have said, then a bullet in her skull, if she was lucky. Steeling her resolve she looked at the vial again, tucking it into the folds of her clothing. Idly she realized there was enough inside for two... it made her lightheaded to think about, but with the options they had... Steeling herself, she closed her eyes an shook.

When the time came, she was be his final angel. An angel of death.

I O I

Claus watched as the massive war machine, lithe and deadly, sat down what looked like a cargo container and set about the business of arming and aiming very dangerous things at his men. Raising a brow, the man stepped forward, his palm resting on the pistol holstered on his hip. "Japanese gunship, you're trespassing on licensed personal military company grounds. We have every right to blast you into scrap. Identify yourself or vacate."

"Ballsy, considering nothing I've scanned in this place could so much as scratch the paint," Mana's voice, altered and emphasized, did it's own blasting over the assembled troops from the Raiden's external speakers. "Your troop ID's say you're Liber Noctis. Good reputation." Claus nodded his head but didn't relax. In fact if Mana wasn't mistaken, he'd gripped the pistol on his side tighter. "As for your identity request, my business is sanctioned by the JSDF for the retrieval of a Japanese national, and is irrelevant."

"Then such a claim cannot be verified, of course," waving, the man replied. Composing himself, Claus regarded the mech with a sneer, "A military search and rescue? What, did the JSDF loose a general? Perhaps he came for the beer?" Turning to his troops, he laughed, as more stopped thinking about the machine's weapons, and focused on their roles. Massive firepower had the effect of breaking down order, when it suddenly appeared, but the banter was giving him time to reestablish his command. Another reason he'd not stepped forward in a posture of surrender – aggression showed he was still lord and master of this place.

Mana understood his gesture, the sarcasm behind it. She also had biometrics, and every search schema the Raiden could spare CPU time on, focused on the surrounding men and their leader. She needed an angle, and badly. "Regardless that is my mission, and orders are orders, and collateral damage isn't a concern." Mana smiled as she saw the man stiffen, his posture going rigid. Not a senseless killer then... noble warrior? Or just enlightened mercenary. "So, as a local PMC, I figure you're pretty in the know about local news."

"Gossip? How droll... but yes. One could say we keep abreast of our immediate zone of operations."

"Good," Mana wished the machine could emulate her smile sometimes. "Then you should know about a Nerv motorcade that was passing through here recently."

Claus snorted, knowing full well the scraps of an armored Nerv vehicle were likely sighted just outside the camp, it's shell being cannibalized for material. "Information costs money."

One of the Raiden's Vulcan cannons spun to life, the barrel whirring like a nest of angry bees. "So do bullets. How many would it take to even up the cost?"

Tactless. Sighing, the man gestured to his lieutenant. "Where's the American?"  
"Slipped though the perimeter, sir."

Damn it. "Well, it seems we're now on the similar mission, Miss Gunship," looking about the camp, he took a count of his current troops. He had too many out on maneuvers today, to make it an even match, if taking on Scott was the order to keep peace. "I believe your errant general has been removed from my care. You're free to step out of that machine and check this, of course."

"How about I step on some of your hard-cover and see what's underneath instead?" Emphasizing her point, the mech picked up a foot and slammed it into the ground, the flanged open toes snapping shut into a spearlike point. "What was the American here for?"

"He was a contractor," Claus announced with a shrug. "Little more, little less. One I may add, that is moving quickly and further away as we speak."

The Raiden told her as much. "I can catch a ground convoy," she replied, leaning the machine down to emphasize her words. "But what I wonder is, why are you interested in him?"

Gesturing to the insignia on his uniform, Claus merely shrugged. "Liber Noctis is a by the books unit. We take contracts after researching, or by referral only. This man had good credentials, and was paying a massive premium. Time was short, and I took the job." Smiling suddenly, the man gestured the lieutenant over and motioned for his datapad. "Single targets like this are almost always vengeance hits, minor political assassinations, or pointless hundreds of other meaningless possibilities. It was only after we recovered the wreckage that the target was confirmed. Here," holding out the pad toward the Raiden, he let it's feed do the rest.

Mana bristled at his offhand description of tactics and justifications. Despite it, he was right – PMC's had a strange legality of their own in these things. Although the chiefs and anyone in the know about a non-legal action could be charged, the system seemed almost aligned against responsibility. Contractors were the ultimate target of any action there, and often that failed, as there were simply too many layers of red tape, or contract details went mysteriously missing. PMC's that turned on their employers didn't get many new contracts.

Raiden's systems identified the man on the pad as Brandon Scott, an American national with ties to the original Project E, as well as a PMC commander himself. "Why are you handing over contract information so readily? Isn't this bad form for a mercenary organization?"

"Simply, I dislike the man," was Claus's terse reply.

Filing that tidbit of information as she looked over the data, Mana considered her options. Scour the camp, looking for sign and trace of Shinji and possibly the man himself, or follow the convoy, banking on this man's word. Her own exceptionally thin legality in this matter was also nagging at her. "Doesn't help we have no grounds legally to search a PMC camp," she added to herself. She'd banked on raw threat to get her way, but this man annoyingly enough, wasn't being bullied. "I think I'll check out this errand friend of yours."

Smiling Claus sketched a bow, before turning to his men. "I thought you might. Try not to knock anything over on the way out."

"Just, you know, as an aside, that contract just tied you as a willing party in the attack of a foreign national on German soil, with intent to ransom. Perhaps you could be a bit more helpful, in assisting me with this."

Braun's steps halted, and he clenched his teeth, cursing the damned American again for getting him so embroiled in this nonsense. "And what, Miss Gunship, would you have me do?"

Heaving a sigh, Mana keyed the ships systems to resume her search. "Two things, nothing too difficult. One, prepare a medical depot for me, as we may not be able to transport my missing general, as you say." The repulsors fired, and the Raiden was airborne, snatching up Maya's cradle in it's grasp. "Second, is forget I was here, when this is over."

As the machine's engines roared, Claus nodded smartly, "Gladly." It helped, he added to himself, that the medical tent was already well used to Mr. Ikari's habitation, and that any report of this machine was likely to be so quickly politicked away that he'd likely not even have a copy of the report himself, the day following.

Mana distantly noted the man's gesture, and set the Raiden's systems to track and catch the convoy, as it made it's way toward more populated zones. What confused her about this was the direction itself. "Why are they heading toward Nerv?"

I O I

Shortly after their clandestine conversation, the convoy came to a halt, making Hikari wonder how soon her resolve would be tested. Cutting into her worry, Shinji mumbled from his position on the floor, "The worst part of this trip, all this time in Germany, and I haven't had a good drink in days." God his jaw ached.

"Shh," not that his mumbling was bothering her, but something was being said outside, and it was hard enough to hear with just the engine idling. "Something's going on."

"Hopefully happy hour," Shinji groused, wincing as his injuries shifted. "OK, ow."

Shortly, the back of the troop transport opened, and the man from earlier made his way inside, "Well, we seem to be comfortable." Sitting on the other side of the injured man, he kicked up his boots, stretching comfortably onto the bench. "Don't mind me, I'm just here to make sure Braun's little note in your files don't cause me any undue annoyance."

Hikari swallowed, her hand straying to the pocket and it's dangerous cargo, "What about our files?"

The man smiled over at her, the expression never reaching his eyes. "Just a small worry he had about you two being bad influences on one another." He noted the quick dart of her eyes to the man laying on the ground, his face drawn in pain. "I would have been here earlier, but I had to make a call," reaching up, he banged heavily on the wall, and the carrier lurched into motion again. Silence, broken only by the occasional bump and rumble of the carrier, ruled for many long minutes. Looking down at the phone he carried, Scott noted the distance they had yet to travel to his destination. "So, Shinji Ikari. Hero of the Angel War. What brings you to Germany?"

Looking over to the man, Shinji tried to rally the strength for a witty comment but failed. "Heard it was lovely this time of year," he said weakly, earning him a swift boot in the ribs from the man.

"Hey!" Hikari moved to go to the young man's side but the pistol leveled at her face told her to stay where she was.

"Tch. Temper." Grinning down at the man curling around his bruised ribs, Scott shuffled so his foot settled more comfortably on the floor by Shinji, a clear warning. "So, lets try again."

Gasping down at his folded arms, the former pilot nodded weakly. "Yeah, Germany. Got a branch here. Came to see how things are going, network. You know, executive bullshittery." Groaning, he uncurled and ignored the screaming in his broken ribs, unset from the man's kick. Given the situation, he was almost sure to receive more of the same.

"Hmm. Probably not a lie... but I won't be satisfied with that," regarding the prone pilot, Scott considered the man's face, drawn with the pain of his injuries and his own internal war to keep from showing the same. "I hear that Germany's Nerv is home to a close friend of yours. Soryu, wasn't it?" Chuckling at Shinji's dark look, the man continued, "well, whatever the reason, I'm glad I had a chance to meet the famous Third Child."

"Somehow, I doubt my public relations team would see this as a successful appearance," expecting the kick this time, Shinji wasn't prepared when it struck his temple, knocking him unconscious. Nearly sobbing, Hikari knelt down to make sure that the pilot's already horrible condition hadn't been worsened.

He was fine, just knocked out, it seemed. Glancing up at the PMC commander, she glared daggers at the man and tried to help Shinji get comfortable. "Why are you doing this? Really?"

"Information is power, Miss Horaki. Why should I tell you?" Despite his snake's grin and tone of derision in his voice to her question, he continued shortly, "Nerv leads the world in research and data management, yet they're all just dogs for the new UN." Regarding her, the man sat back, but kept his pistol across his hip. "Contrary to your probable beliefs, I don't wish ill on the Director, here."

"Could have fooled me," Hikari snapped, her eyes on the fast-bruising color that spread across Shinji's ribs again.

Scott shrugged fractionally, "Regardless, I'm just performing a service for another. Braun didn't know what he had, with the pilot, and I didn't feel the urge to correct the issue." Taking a deep breath, the man looked over the small datapad on his phone, smiling. "Tell me, Miss Horaki, who owns Nerv?"

Confused, the girl immediately looked to Shinji, but the man's immediate laughter dragged her eyes back to his face. "No. Not him. In name, yes, but the UN's watchdogs keep Nerv under tight control. In truth, the UN owns them, but because of this man, Nerv will never see it's potential."

"I don't understand," Hikari also didn't care, but she needed the man talking. If he was talking, he wasn't hurting them or threatening them.

"If the man here falls, then Nerv reverts from a private company, to a sub-body under the control of the UN. Which means, that Nerv will once again have the potential to do what it did best," he couldn't help but laugh when the woman's face went deathly pale. "Yes! Evangelions. Not the great monsters of myth, but new, exciting technology. All these advances, all this progress in medicine and meta-biology, and yet none of it military? How naïve the world can be.

"Nerv may not be making the weapons in their factories, but they are getting made. And I have here, the key to making that war machine so much more efficient. Imagine, the greatest minds on earth, the most advanced factories and development systems, all working for one goal: war." As he spoke, Hikari noted the trucks slowing, and the occasional bit of scenery behind them growing more and more sparse. She looked about frantically as the sudden darkness inside the truck swelled up and stole her vision. "Almost there," the man crooned, somewhere in the darkness.

Hikari didn't care for world military politics. The advent of the PMC explosion was almost lost to her, were it not for the mistake that landed her with Liber Noctis. What she didn't understand of the man's rambling was his own stake in this, as a small unit commander wasn't what she'd consider a heavy player in the global power market. Hikari didn't understand his need to see Nerv back in the weapons development arena. So long ago, and for a very specific purpose, such things had been the norm, but Nerv was never, had never made weapons specifically for the use against other people. She did gather, however, that Shinji's death would open up that floodgate, and had no desire to see the kind of madness that the minds responsible for Eva, focused on killing each other could accomplish. Which meant... "I'm sorry Shinji, I can't... I can't let him do this. I want to keep you from suffering, but... you have to live. A while longer," she told herself this, wishing she could tell the pilot, but would let it go, something for another day. Still, some things didn't add up, "Hasn't almost all of Nerv been refitted to be only research though? What good would it do?"

"Nerv's bases span the globe. They reach each major continent, each primary land mass. If it were to become the basis for development and mobilization, under one government control, then what need of a league of nations, when the seat of power is already firmly established." Chucking, the man stood unsteadily as the truck pulled to a halt. "And not everything is what it appears. We've arrived. See to your patient."

I O I

"God... damn it." Mana tried to relocate the trail, on either visual or infrared but all she found was a dead-ending trail that lead into a mountain face, that looked like a recent fall of scree from some development further up the slope. "Maya!"

"You don't have to scream, Kirishima." Sighing up at the camera, the brown haired tech pulled up her data terminal and waited for the connection to the Raiden to open. "What's the problem?"

Routing her sensor data to Maya, she scanned the area again, thinking there was simply an error in her systems. "Trail went cold. Cold and strange. I have tread marks, IR and chemical trail leading to a damn rock face."

"Tried knocking?" the tech replied, before holding onto the hammock as the cargo bay rocked wildly. "Hey! Stop it!"

"Yeah... some of us are trying to sleep," Kodama glanced up, yawning hugely as Maya stared at her dumbly. "What? It's not like this is terribly interesting, you know."

Her hands lighting over the data, Maya frowned. "I thought you were just being your usual dense self-"

"I swear I'll shake this thing like a British nanny if you say another word that isn't relevant..."

Coughing, Maya looked up at the camera and grinned, "Right. As I was saying, the sensors are right. Either there's a trick to it, or it's simpler than it looks."

"Suggestions?"

"Kick it?"

Mana blinked a moment, then shrugged. "Knew I brought you with for a reason," and did exactly that, swinging the Raiden's closed foot at the blank face before her. Mildly surprised at the utter lack of resistance or contact, she set the mech to hover in place. "So, that's not what I was expecting."

Maya agreed, but not with Mana's annoyance. "Why is there a dynamic image projector in such a place? How is there... " her voice died off as the woman went about checking on a hunch, something that nagged at her since she looked at the supplied map on her datapad. "Mana... Nerv is only across this mountain range. In fact the property listing in this zone is under personnel housing. I don't like this."

"Oh I'm liking it fine," the woman snarled over the comm, and Maya quickly settled her pad into the hammock, fearing for it's life. A lurch confirmed her fears as the Raiden jumped up into the air, gaining altitude to survey the surrounding area. "Maya, I see Nerv-3 over in the next valley, and Berlin beyond, any chance of closing in without a military alert getting us shot at?"

"Slim to none."

Shrugging, Mana opened up her comms and had the Raiden transmit her message directly to Nerv, "This is Mana Kirishima, pilot of gunship Raiden of the JSDF, requesting landing and berth. Repeat, this is..." A similar message was sent to the Berlin airspace, which she assumed would be quite the incident once she got home. She wasn't worried, as in the end, the only person who could fire her, was potentially inside that mysterious mountain. Plus, she had her insurance, recently printed from the Raiden's systems, resting in the greatcoat she'd brought along.

Five minutes later, she was setting down Maya's impromptu home, and docking the Raiden onto a heliport pad outside of Nerv-3 Germany. Docking was perhaps the wrong term, as the mech's internal systems didn't need replenishing, and she left the machine 'idling', it's primary power and interface systems still hot. As she set the machine's head down, opening the cockpit, Maya and Kodama stepped out of the bay, stretching and trying to stamp blood back into their limbs. Against Maya's suggestion, Mana kept on the interface suit, her gut telling her to keep the Raiden on a short leash, if the tunnel below that mountainside really did lead inside Nerv-3. As such, while the other two techs looked their usual, if someone wrinkled selves, Mana was walking around in a skin-tight, layered bodysuit, covered by a remarkably out of place overcoat, with her helm and the spinal phase-2 connection complex still hugging her spine like a second set of vertebrae. Snapping up the lexan face guard, the portion that covered her eyes snapped back to the sides, and she blinked at the odd angle of the sun, in this much greener place.

"We certainly make a rather..." Maya stalled as the JSDF liaison clipped a pistol to her hip, and a few spare clips into her thigh-side pockets. "Mana?"

"You want one? I have a spare." When the tech's eyes widened, her head shaking hard, Mana shrugged.

"Yes, please. Have a spare clip?" The firearm was tossed to Kodama, as Maya boggled, the spare clip following shortly. Both were caught deftly, and tucked into the woman's clothes without hesitation. "Thanks, USP?"

Nodding, Mana settled herself and with a mental keying, set the Raiden to self-zone security. Anyone not her, Maya or Kodama would get a nasty surprise, if they came too close to the machine. "Heckler and Koch USP Tactical in .45 ACP." When she looked to the still boggling Maya, she simply shrugged, "When in Rome."

Maya was looking between the two women like they'd just sprouted wings and AT fields. "'Dama? These are our allies, our peers. I can understand Mana – she's military, and allowed at her rank, but why did you want a gun?"

Smiling, the woman sorted through her medical bag, slinging the backpack over her shoulder to conceal the bulge at her back. "We just had a run in with a PMC that admitted to taking hostile and fatal action against a Nerv convoy. Drivers and bodyguards, or need I remind you there was no mention of survivors?" When Maya paled, the woman nodded once, continuing, "Additionally, the people holding Shinji now, provided that man wasn't lying, are also trained soldiers. I would rather have, than not have, at this point.

"And as for Nerv... well I never liked the way Asuka ran things up here." Smiling demurely, the medical tech stood beside Maya, and motioned along the corridor, where the flashing lights over the door further along indicated the main facility entrance.

Staying close to one another, the three women walked toward the doorway, only to be met there by a very excited, very mobile redhead. "Maya! You finally came!" Asuka ran the rest of the way to meet them, her personal guards looking wary and uncomfortable as they jogged forward, the black suits and Nerv armbands identifying them as internal security. Holding the former bridge bunny at arm's length, the smiling ex-pilot looked her over, "Wow, you've barely changed. How are things back in T-3?"

Laughing nervously, the tech spared her companions a glance before replying, "Not so great, really. Have you heard the news?"

"About Shinji?" Her expression visibly falling, the woman nodded once. "Yeah, but we've not heard or seen anything of him. Is that why you're here?" It seemed then that she woman finally noted Maya's other companions, and the curious blue eyes hardened when they swept over Mana. "Ah. Kirishima."

"Soryu," the JSDF liaison sketched a slight bow before returning to a loose, attentive stance, not bothering to spare the woman any more than a cursory glance. She wanted to drop the visor and have the Raiden keep a biometric on the woman, but figured the act would be futile. If trends continued from when they were younger, she held the truth as variable as a lawyer.

Kodama introduced herself, and the atmosphere warmed, as Asuka had recently been in contact with Kodama's middle sister Hikari, but not for the last few weeks since her birthday party.

She'd never gotten along with Asuka. Partly due to the young woman's own nature picking up on Mana's real intent, unlike the others. She'd tried so hard, right from the start to prove or convince the others she was a spy.

The other half of her issue with the pilot was flat out personality incompatibility. Almost everything about the young woman screamed "spoiled brat", which to Mana was utterly anathema. Growing up in a military environment made her very appreciative of the few luxuries she had, so the redhead's mentality grated on her mightily. It was more than just personality though.

Mana's sense of people was fairly acute, something that had been long ingrained into her as a young operative in the military stable. The fact she was singled out to do intelligence work only reinforced and emphasized that, as those operatives needed additional training on information gathering. Turning those instincts toward Asuka usually ended with Mana suffering a narcissism and self-destruction overdose headache.

Admittedly, once her future beyond piloting had become a real point of concern, things had changed quickly. Asuka started using her intelligence and the knowledge she'd gained from her college studies, and applied them to work in Nerv's divisions. It was by her own merit, not her name or status, that she rose in the ranks where she was. Likely there was little way to truly distance herself from those ideas, but that just made her work harder. Mana respected that, and was happy for the person that Asuka had grown into.

Still didn't change the fact the redhead was a vindictive, soulless harpy.

Asuka and Kodama were still chatting, the redhead's attention turning to Maya for a few moments, as they walked. Mana spent no effort pretending to include herself in conversation, content at the moment to listen, and observe.

It was ironic, she thought after a moment of listening to the three women bantering back and forth. Here she was, Shinji's right hand, his executive assistant and most trusted advisor, standing back and letting the conversation run along without her.

"... and then Hikari threw up all over the guy, and he ran screaming out of the room!"

Perhaps it wasn't such a bad thing.

"You're with the JSDF, right? A military escort?" Surprising her, one of Asuka's security force voiced the question, having dropped back to her side as they walked down the corridors of Nerv-3. The man was tall, built strongly beneath the suit like his counterpart, and if she wasn't mistaken, had a firearm tucked under his arm. If not for the red armband with the black Nerv-3 logo, she'd have taken him for the security back in Tokyo-3.

Mana decided along time ago that trust was an asset, and one that many used against their allies and enemies alike. She had used it against the pilots and Nerv so long ago, to get close enough to learn more of the Evangelions and how the pilots functioned inside them, for her own team's use. Although it seemed like a bleak outlook, in truth she trusted many people. Asuka and Nerv-3, though, were not on that list.

She's long ago decided to discard the pretense of approaching this as Shinji's concerned assistant, particularly with the backup in her pocket. "I'm Director Ikari's executive liaison to the JSDF, personal assistant and acting sub-Commander," that seemed to cause a stir up ahead, as the other women stalled, Asuka looking to have been mid step. Mana suppressed a small smile. "I am also his fiancée. Mana Kirishima, pleased to meet you," extending her hand, the man seemed to hesitate a moment, unsure whether protocol dictated he shake it, or casually ignore the gesture, after having started the conversation.

As she'd expected, the introduction pulled Asuka's attention, "Sub-Commander? I thought that Nerv wasn't following the old structural lines anymore, with Shinji deciding on a less military title, Director." Smirking the woman conspicuously straitened her uniform, the small badges declaring her both a Major in the German state military, as well as Director in chief of Nerv-3.

"It wouldn't be the first time you were wrong," Mana offhandedly replied, pointedly ignoring the venomous look the redhead shot her at the comment. "Mr. Ikari takes whatever title he feels comfortable with. Director was more... appropriate than Conductor, after all. His musical hangups are amusing, really," she added as an aside, smiling. "That the other branches followed his lead, well." Shrugging, she continued down the corridor a few paces, outdistancing the others easily. "That just shows how much ahead of the pack he is. Coming?"

Kodama and Maya were shocked at how openly hostile the two women were to one another. Kodama knew, in fact, that on at least two separate occasions Mana had been the one to choose the gifts Asuka received from Shinji. That the same person she saw with him picking out jewelry could be this woman confused her. She and Maya strode to catch up, as their host stomped along, her guards to either side.

Shortly they were ushered into Asuka's offices, which unsurprising to Mana, were larger and more cathedralesque compared to Shinji's own humble space. Settling herself down behind the large desk at the room's head, the woman leaned back in her chair, motioning for her guards to wait outside the door. It was, in Mana's opinion, at once very regal and very unnecessary. She'd despaired to know they'd be speaking with Asuka in her offices, rather than moving through Nerv-3 looking to see if that tunnel access was indeed linked to the base. It was a waste of time, and as the minutes passed, she knew her patience was going to be tested sorely.

Spinning her chair to face them, Asuka smiled, back in her element, "Would you like something to drink?" At a nod from Maya and Kodama, she buzzed her own assistant, who seemed on appearance more a maid than a secretary. "I'd heard that Nerv was sending someone to help with the search, but didn't expect the JSDF to be involved. Isn't that a contradiction in interests, Mana?"

Having declined refreshments, Mana simply sat in the chair across from Asuka at her desk, hands in her lap. "You mean of course the legal binding that prohibits Nerv from military research and manufacture?" At the redheads terse nod, Mana continued, "That is still observed. However, the JSDF considers Shinji a national of considerable influence, and any party hoping to capitalize on his position will see themselves quickly at the end of a very unpleasant situation. After all, he is, despite being the head of Nerv, the hero of the Angel War." And yes, she added for her own benefit, it is a conflict of interests. It just so happens the JSDF still use Nerv for some projects, under the table, and that Nerv going to the UN too soon would be quite detrimental to their own ideas.

The sound of cracking glass was loud in the following silence, as Asuka's face reddened in anger at the off and way her own role in the War was downplayed. "He wasn't the only one there-"

"I'm not here to discuss the past," interrupting the redhead's building tirade, Mana pulled a folio from her coat, and laid it down on the desk in front of the fuming Director of Nerv-3. "This, is an order, sanctioned by the JSDF to release any and all information regarding Shinji's whereabouts."

Asuka dropped her cracked glass into a wastebasket, not bothering to look at the forms. "The JSDF has no authority here."

"But the UN does. And you'll find that the UN are the undersigned of the order, authorizing the JSDF to act as, and assign investigators into his abduction." Pretense at pleasantries gone, Mana stood and looked down at the redhead as she tore into the folio, her eyes raking over the forms there. "I am also authorized to relieve any persons, including yourself, of duty if they impede the investigation."

Taking a breath, Asuka let the folio fall and leaned back, her knuckles white as her hands rested on it's armrests. Despite her apparent calm, her eyes spoke volumes of murder, visited on the auburn haired woman before her. "So. I still think it odd, that the UN would be so interested in this. Wouldn't they be more than willing to see Nerv go out of private hands?"

Mana nodded once, her visor catching the gaudy lighting, "Indeed they would. But do you honestly think something so obvious as an abduction or assassination of someone like Shinji would somehow not be thrown back into the UN's face?" Snorting, the woman shook her head, "Can you imagine the uproar that would occur is there were connections between the UN and that? Killing a world hero?"

Drawing in a breath, Maya took a moment to try and catch up with what was going on, in the office. So far, Asuka had welcomed them, but denied knowing anything about Shinji, but here she was seeing the woman hedge and dodge even slightly related questions. Then Mana pulled out a bombshell in that UN decree, and her status as special investigator. Then the two going on about the UN's interest in Nerv, though not news, opened her eyes on how precisely precarious the position Shinji held was.

So many tangles, she thought quietly, her mind trying to undo the web of politics that was becoming apparent here.

"So, Director Soryu," if Mana had noticed the flinch that Maya showed at her tone, she didn't show it, "You said that there wasn't any communication between Director Ikari's convoy and Nerv-3?"

"That would be what the report says," Asuka replied, gesturing to the same forms they'd all seen back in Tokyo-3. "German airspace reported his flight landing, his motorcade departing. A checkpoint station outside of Nerv-3 reported his vehicle crossing. Beyond that, we received no word."

"I see." Crossing to the other side of the room, she pulled out a printed photo of the man that Braun had identified as the one holding Shinji captive, laying it on the Director's desk. "Seen him before?"

Her eyes narrowing, Asuka nodded, "Yeah, he was a guest in the facility some time back, one of the people here had given him access for a visit. So what?"

That set Maya and Kodama on edge, as the pieces seemed to be falling into place. Kodama didn't want to think about the possibility that Asuka could be working against Shinji, but it was just too easy. They'd been rivals too long, and such a thing just seemed par for the course with the former pilots.

Mana was thinking the same thing, only... something wasn't adding up. "You're also a Major, as your badge there says," pointing to Asuka's chest the redhead nodded. "Majors have duty over field offices that manage, among other things, PMC commissions and deployment, barracks and licensing, correct?"

Looking away, Asuka shrugged, "I do that, yes. It's not something the military insists on me working on," When Mana raised a brow, the former pilot threw her hands up and glowered. "I'm a figurehead, OK? It's an honorary rank. They don't make me do anything."

"But, by your rank, you'd have access to records, licenses and internal commissions for those units." When Asuka nodded, Mana tapped the photo again, "this man is supposedly holding Shinji, and he's an American PMC commander. Just so you know."

Asuka looked up sharply, as the implication in Mana's words became clear. "I hope you're no insinuating that I had anything to do with Shinji's disappearance, Mana. That's one hell of a claim to put down without proof."

Mana decided to change course, with her next question, "Nerv-3 just received a fund increase, to augment their carbon research, in hopes of securing an internal source for microcarbon technology, isn't that correct?"

Still ruffled from the earlier questions, Asuka nodded, shrugging, "Yes, five percent. Shinji authorized it himself."

"Where are your budget records?" Her tone didn't make it a question, so much as a command.

Asuka stood, her blue eyes glittering angrily in the room's light, "Don't come into my facility and order me around," she grated, voice cast dangerously.

In answer, Mana simply tapped the UN order still laying on the woman's desk. "You can either give it to me, or I will relieve you, have you thrown in jail for obstructing a UN investigation, and take it myself."

"Mana!" Maya's voice cut over the quiet malice the two were spreading over the room, and the JSDF liaison spared her a glance, "what's this got to do with anything?"

Again, Mana tapped the orders, and Asuka slammed her hand down onto a buzzer, calling in German for someone angrily. Shortly, a pudgy, bespectacled man entered, introducing himself as Maxwell von Kessler, Nerv-3's financial head. "The Director said you had some questions, yes? Regarding the current budget, hmm?" His odd method of speech annoyed Mana, and something about him was both familiar and unsettling, but discarding those thoughts, she motioned for him to continue. "Yes, let me access the system then."

Data scrolled over the small screen that faced them, as behind it Asuka sat with her hands laced before her, angry and silent. Shortly, the results appeared, and Mana looked over them with a critical eye. "Maya, access and verify this."

"Right."

Moving to connect her datapad to the terminal, Maxwell slid to intercept her, "I'm sorry, but the specific research funding is classified, and-"

"Under UN jurisdiction. Move aside," Mana's hand strayed to her sidearm, and the pudgy man grinned, nodding and stepping back.

"Yes, yes of course. I wasn't aware, yes."

Swallowing, Maya spared Asuka an apologetic look, to which the redhead shrugged. "Accessing now," she informed Mana, as the data funneled into her own terminal. Sitting, the woman's expression went confused, and she looked up to Mana after a moment. "Kirishima?"

"Yes?" Turning her attention to the tech, she came to her side, looking over the datapad. What she saw didn't please her. "Four percent of recent funds being routed to personnel housing..."

Asuka blinked, looking up from her angry contemplations. "What? That can't be right. I declined that proposal."

It all made sense. The blind at the rock face, personnel housing, Asuka's animosity toward Shinji, the UN and her connection to the German Military... Sneering, Mana pulled her weapon, training it on the Director. "I'm sure. Asuka, you are hereby relieved of duty as lead of Nerv-3. Surrender your pass cards and codes immediately, and be prepared to proceed to a detention block."

"Hold on a god damn minute, I'm telling-"

"Mana!" Kodama's yell broke her focus, as the woman pointed back toward the doors. "Maxwell! He slipped out while you were questioning Asuka."

Scanning the room, she found the doctor wasn't mistaken. "Asuka, why would your accountant run away?" Why indeed... again she was struck by that sense that something wasn't right... or perhaps, too right. "Damn it."

Eyeing the JSDF officer angrily, Asuka stood and keyed her communications system. "Security, detain von Kessler on sight. Non-lethal force allowed." Turning back to the weapon now loosely trained on her, she shook her head. "I don't know, but I plan to find out."

"You said you declined the housing proposal, why?" As they looked over Mana's data, the four women came to an obvious conclusion, as various funds were being pulled off, by small options and trivial side projects to fund changes and renovations to an abandoned subterranean barracks. Someone wanted it done, regardless. As Mana read on, she holstered her sidearm, and frowned.

Asuka looked over the information and swore, "It was extraneous. The barracks were proposed long ago, in the event of a war-time situation. Due to the separation of Nerv from the military, it was declined as a sign that we'd be holing up in defense." She accessed the primary records, and found all the funds routed via proposals tagged on to larger, vital projects, all handled by Kessler. "That son of a bitch."

"Maya, get to work on Kessler, I want to know everything," checking her pockets, Mana pulled the slide on her USP, checking the round there. To her surprise, Asuka stopped her, a hand on her arm. "Soryu?"

"Just shut up and listen a minute." Taking a breath, the woman looked away, before speaking again, "Shinji was the only person to try. He didn't care about any of the bullshit that went on in my past, wasn't stunned by my record, or anything. He treated me like a person. Despite me." Looking up at Mana, her blue eyes were hard, but not in anger. "I envy you. What can I do to help?"

Stunned and somewhat put back, the JSDF officer hesitated, shaking her head. "I... I'm sorry about earlier-"

"That's not important. If what we're thinking is true, then-" Asuka's intercom beeped urgently, and the woman looked to it, her brow furrowing, "Yes?"

"Director, we have a situation here," a voice called, behind it the staccato sound of gunfire. "We tracked von Kessler to the labs, but lost him. He's taken a number of prototypes and we think he's holed up in the caverns beyond sub-floor B-2"

"What's with the gunfire?"

A pause, before the security agent's voice came through again. "Apparently, he has help."

I O I

"The local security can't hold, most are only armed with pistols," his subordinate's report made, the man left. Sitting atop one of the troop carriers, his back to the raised canopy that shielded the back, Scott looked over the small encampment and facility, etched into the very walls of Nerv-3 and the bedrock that cradled it.

Three more such places existed. Facilities hidden within themselves. Clever delusions held and maintained by his employer's faction, their existence an open secret inside the UN. Inspectors to these four locations were paid well to turn a blind eye to the research that went forward, bolstering the power of the body as a whole.

Scott smiled, remembering his contact's instructions. Bring the Nerv executive to the underground base below Nerv-3, then wait for the next step. Things would go off without a hitch, no matter the complications. A plan was pointless unless it was made to consider multiple options. In this, there was so much that could go wrong, but it wouldn't matter.

His goals would be achieved. His potential finally recognized. Nerv had denied him Evangelion, refused to let him show the world his power, his supreme talent. So in payment for that slight, he'd give them an enemy, more terrible than Angels. One Nerv had made itself.

"Ah, Scott, I take it you're trip went well?" His eyes turned to the fat, sweating man that stood beside the vehicle, and he smiled.

Brandon stood and stretched, nodding. "Very well, in fact. The Director's condition is deteriorating rapidly."

"Excellent." His hand rubbing together eagerly, von Kessler looked back toward the gunfire that followed him down the facility. "Your troops can hold them for the time we need, yes?"

Nodding, Scott hopped down beside the shorter man, "Nerv is demilitarized, they don't stand a chance." Looking toward the guard that was set to watch his captives, Scott couldn't help but smile. It only grew larger at von Kessler's next words.

"Yes, good. Begin the second phase. Burn this place to the ground."

A/N: Yep, amost there. Heroes don't just happen - they need a reason. And all Shinji's reasons are about in place.


	4. Chapter 4

**Heroes of Evangelion**

**An Iron Will**

I O I

"Slow steps Shinji, you've been in there a while," Kodama's voice rang oddly dull in his ears, as his weight shifted unsteadily over limbs that felt made of overcooked soba noodles. His hands shot out, flailing for the handrails as a small, sarcastic part of his mind replayed Unit-01's initial faceplant into the streets of Tokyo-3.

To his credit, the live-action version was very true to history. "OK, ow."

Stifling a laugh behind her hand, his one other observer leaned down so she could see the look in his eye, a fall of red hair easily getting his attention. "Does the Invincible Shinji need help?"

"Depends on what you're offering to help with," he quipped, satisfied as the comment did it's rounds of altering her expression. Acknowledgment, confusion, shock, rage... then laughter.

"Baka."

Rolling over on to his back, Shinji reached up and ran a finger along the inset metal rim that sat above his heart. "Always."

I O I

"Mmhh. What?" Mumbling through his hazed perceptions, Shinji noted first that the pain in his head only got worse when he was awake. That initial momentum of sharp head stabbing fun seemed to expand on everything else he did. Basically, thinking about what made his head hurt, made his head hurt. This was, a petulant little voice decided, all Hikari's fault. At least until that other guy came back

Something sounded like bubblewrap being twisted, nearby, and... a carousel. Not trusting himself to do more than blink his eyes open and look up at the woman, Shinji forced the pain and the disorientation from his mind as the sounds resolved themselves to the staccato of gunfire and the occasional scream of orders.

"We have to move Shinji, something's going on," As she bit her lip and looked around anxiously, the young woman peered again at the guard behind the troop carrier. He stood uneasily, looking behind the vehicle often, his hands gripping and fidgeting with the machine gun he held. It was hard to tell the direction the man was looking, with the goggles and visor he had, but if posture were any indicator, Hikari figured the man's attention was anywhere but on them. "Do you think you can walk?"

Shinji wanted to say yes. He really did, but the fact of the matter was, he could barely breathe, much less walk. "Sure," he rasped, figuring if nothing else maybe him dying all over the trooper behind the truck would buy her some time.

I can't do this, he thought as an odd clarity washed over him.

He'd been in this place before, hadn't he?

Yes, this corridor led to the cages. His legs were weighted with anxiety, sorrow, heart slowing with the depression of all the loss, all the absolute loss and unreal, soul-crushing futility of what they were asking him to do. Save people? What did he know about saving anyone? The JSDF was outside, inside the base. He'd heard Asuka screaming, railing against the troops outside and then...

"You fucking bitch, I can't believe you'd show your face here!" Silence answered the redhead, as she screamed again, launching another snatched VTOL at the lumbering form of the T-Raiden unit that sat in front of her like a personal insult.

He couldn't save her. He tried, during the fifteenth, but they wouldn't let him loose! Tried t break past his own fear and self-loathing and comfort the one person in his universe that could not be so broken, so weak.

She pushed him away. She didn't need him. Asuka was there, and in the end, she would win. Without him, she was flawless.

Sounds of the battle continued, but muffled, distant and echoing.

It didn't reach him. He was too busy trying to die by willing it, curled up under a stairwell.

"You have to get up Shinji, we have to go! Come on, please," her tears were making her look younger, Shinji noted distantly, as Misato pulled him up by an arm. Christ he hurt all over... it didn't matter. Soon none of this would matter... he made a noise, half protest, half gurgled breath as something lanced through the side he was being supported by, against the slight woman.

She must be mourning, his mind said through a haze of cotton and hurt. She was too thin, too small feeling. "I'm sorry, Misato. I should have said... something. When you got that message... I'm so sorry, Kaji..."

Misato was sobbing openly now, trying hard to haul him bodily to the Evangelion that he knew she'd say would protect him – protect all of them. He wanted to laugh, but knew it would only cause more pain.

"Stay with me! God damn it, not now... Shinji!" Her face contorted with despair, he thought she was beautiful, just then. So real. So human. Gone here the hard lines that made her the Major, gone was that air of implacable vengeance and sorrow that her father left in her. This was now, this sadness, this pain. He felt her shudder against his side and it bit into his body with iron teeth.

Something struck him in the shoulder and spun him, but it didn't matter, the elevator was just ahead. He could see the dark, small cave of it yawning before him. Past that door, everything got worse. Shinji stumbled on, as the woman beside him jerked wildly, trying to aim a gun that appeared far too large in her hands. No, Misato had a pistol, this wasn't unusual. She must have taken the machine gun from one of the JSDF soldiers. It made sense. Small things that he could focus on, that made sense pleased him, as the dire presence of Eva above him called, a siren to him.

_Complete me._

_Complement us_. He could almost see Rei, her face huge and smiling before him already. God how I miss you, Rei, he wanted to scream, but the strength wasn't in him. Not yet. Soon, but not yet. "I'm coming," he managed to rasp, as his back struck the far wall of the elevator. Something wet and hot was in his mouth and he spat it against the floor, uncaring. "Misato?"

She stood inside the elevator, confusing him. Her little hands smacked, slammed and pounded at the door as something pounded into his hip, startling a breath from him and rattling him like a bird in a cage. Misato screamed and rained death down the hallway.

That was right. She was here, and got shot and -

He reached out, as she stopped the sputtering of the gun and the surprise on her face pulled a frown onto his features, as the elevator door shut with a rumbling crash. She stood there, brown eyes blinking at him, as his hand made bloody tracks on her shoulder. "You're bleeding," he said, knowing she was just a ghost now. Just an image of the person he knew, lay dying outside the doors of the elevator below him.

She sniffled mightily, her body shaking, shuddering under his hand. The elevator, he reasoned. Misato never shook like that. She was strength. Resolute. He loved her. Ah. Right. "You forgot something," he murmured, slumping so his forehead leaned against hers. Small hands sped out to support him, keeping the illusion right. "You forgot to kiss me."

Misato's eyes went huge as he leaned down, parting her lips with his and hoping that the blood he tasted on her wasn't the first memory of LCL, sneaking into the now. Eva was soon, Eva and mother had their time.

This was Misato's time. Her memory. Her breath was sweet, hot. Her lip quivered, as her entire body shuddered with the motion of the elevator. Shinji always wondered... In that moment, and as his mind slowly shut down, he hazarded to ask, "What did you mean, by do the rest," he mumbled against her still trembling lips.

Blackness swept over him, as his leg finally gave out and slumping against the lift wall, Shinji fell, a shell shocked Hikari following soon after, the only thing on her mind that was even close to a coherent thought rebounding inside her skull like the gunfire they'd recently escaped.

"He kissed me. He kissed me... he kissed me." She reached up a hand that shook like a leaf and wiped at the blood that was on her lips, from Shinji's surprisingly thorough kiss.

Hikari's mind struggled with all that had happened, trying in vain to sort the images. She'd lunged at the soldier finally, her nerves frayed and gone and with a howl, smashed the small vial, her hand cushioned with a balled up wad of bandaging, against the man's head. Her other hand had ripped the goggles and balaclava off savagely, exposing the man's vulnerable face. Glass and drug mixed freely in the explosion of blood that was the man's nose and eye, as he fell heavily back. Somehow the exchange was missed, probably due to the explosions rocking the place they were, raining rock dust on them.

And then Shinji had all but thrown her ahead of him, stumbling after and levering his shoulder into her back, his arm wrapped around her own. She's barely had time to snatch up the fallen soldier's gun, before their stumbling exposure had alerted the nearby troops.

Then the shooting began in force. She's held on to his arm gratefully, as her own speed seemed insufficient to him. Despite it, he ran with his head down, eyes unfocused on the ground, his mouth working silently. Hikari moved to better support his weight and then-

"I'm sorry, Misato. I should have said... something. When you got that message... I'm so sorry, Kaji..." Swallowing hard she let her despair well up and tear through her, wracking her body momentarily. He was gone, his mind not even there.

"Stay with me! God damn it, not now... Shinji!" Screaming, she turned him as they rounded another truck, the moment's respite in their fleeing giving her the time to hopefully snap him out of this. He'd looked up at her then, his face lifting, as if seeing her for the first time.

Then he'd snapped his head around and she followed that gaze and saw it. A freight lift was open, it's bay welcoming them like home. Snatching his arm, she braced against his side and felt his ribs shift. Stifling her own cry at knowing she was hurting him, probably killing him, the woman struggled on toward the elevator.

All but one of the shots that followed missed them. The impact against his shoulder spun them forward and she noted with a growing sense of dread the unchanging, set cast to Shinji's face. He'd whispered something, as he looked up and... out, at the wall and then they were moving again, his shambling, offcenter run all but forcing her ahead to keep him moving. Like a miracle, they made it into the lift before they were struck again, and he leaned there while she tried to get the thing to work.

"Why is it all in fucking Russian," she screeched, smacking at the keys randomly, as the troops that were chasing them rounded the last troop carrier, gaining line of sight on them. Her eyes went wide as shots poured into the small space, and she heard Shinji sputter and the soft impact of...

Something in Hikari came loose. She'd never wanted to hurt anyone, _ever_, as much as she did right now. A small babbling part of her mind was still horrified at the brutality of attack on the guard earlier, but now... she looked down at the machine gun and her breath going fast and rapid, pulled the charging lever and screamed.

The first soldier, unable to see well because of the angle and gloom inside the lift, died as her shots nearly cut him in half. Beside him, the other soldier was diving for cover as her fire set a bloody trail from hip to shoulder as his lunge stalled, the impacts throwing him across the front of a truck like a rag doll.

Reinforcements held cover behind one of the carriers, and a man there readied a grenade to launch into the small box but his timing, and Hikari's luck, were too aligned at that precise moment. Sighting the girl shooting randomly and wildly at their position, the man motioned his team back, snapping lose the timing pin and lobbing it toward the deathtrap that lay open and waiting for it. As the explosive left his hand, Hikari closed her eyes and screamed again, uncaring who would shoot back, who she shot, or what at that point. It'd all gone so wrong.

One of those wild shots hit the grenade, not more than a meter from the soldiers. Hellfire bloomed around the carrier, as they were thrown down or back, and the doors to the lift mercifully slammed shut, a moment after the magazine to Hikari's gun went dry.

And then Shinji had spun her around, his eyes intense and focused. It took long moments to realize he was talking, speaking quietly. Then as he leaned against her, his hands running over her shoulders and arms slowly, Shinji's final words managed to penetrate the shock she was going into. "You forgot to kiss me." Hikari's brain shut down, when his tongue, tasting slightly of blood snaked between her lips.

"Do the rest...?" Her fingers worked, feeling the viscosity of the blood between thumb and finger before her vision went gray and she joined the dying pilot in blissful slumber on the lift floor. She remained there as the lift finished it's trek, opening up to two very surprised women and three confused security agents.

I O I

"This is looking more and more like a setup," Maya called over the sound of squalling tires on tile, as the miniature tram lift tore down the halls of Nerv-3, the four women and three security force personnel taxing it's limits.

Cursing the glorified golf cart's speed limitations, Mana looked over her shoulder and spared first Maya, then Asuka a glance. "Oh?"

Asuka didn't miss the look, but was too engrossed in trying to keep her facility in one piece. Speaking with a man beside her, his own attention glued to a data terminal he'd patched into the personnel and security grid. Although they couldn't track what went on below in the false housing project, she could monitor her own force and the progress they were making. "How can we be losing so much ground?"

"The force occupying the lower sections are heavily armed, and have body armor that defeats most of our ammunitions," the man replied, shaking his head. "We don't have the firepower to deal with them."

Maya's own data kept her making small noises of discovery every thirty seconds. It was beginning to grate on – Mana winced as another little chirp from the tech set her teeth on edge. "Can you just explain what you're seeing please? I'm really not in a mood to wait for the report later."

"Oh, right," biting her lip, Maya flailed about a moment as the tram took a turn too fast, almost losing her seat. "Kessler routed the funds to excavate and supply the sub-floor over the last two years. Apparently the man had a habit of firing or getting his aides transferred to other departments. Eventually he just didn't have anyone working with him."

Leaning over Maya's shoulder, Asuka looked over the material as well. "We had so many complaints, I just let it go. He managed everything well enough, I always wondered how. But he was an accountant, I didn't spare it another thought. Plus, all our UN audits came up clear, I had no reason to suspect him."

"UN audits," Mana murmured, not liking that aspect one bit. If Maya could snap the pieces together this fast, at team of UN bookkeepers should have seen it from Geneva. "What else?" She cut another turn, slamming on the provided klaxon as they rounded a populated hallway.

Her fingers unsteady, Maya managed to get her next tab up, "Scott visited under his guest pass. Also it looks like von Kessler was... oh wow."

"I hate it when you stop at the good parts, Maya," her voice brittle, Mana curbed the tram by a lateral lift depot, eyeing the speed tubes speculatively. "Shit." Maya turned the pad to Mana, and the woman's eyes narrowed under her visor. "Oh I'm so going to kill that pig."

Asuka turned the pad so she could see, and read the small series of correlated data, her hands shaking by the time she was done. "Implicated in the deployment of troops against Tokyo-3, dismissed from the UN Security Council, cleared of charges... applied for German citizenship... Why did none of this ping on our personnel records? What the fuck is going on here?"

"Someone wanted him inside," Mana ground out, checking the routing points for the tube station. "Everyone on cart 224. I'm going back to the Raiden, cover their escape route."

"I'm going with you." Asuka's tone stalled the JSDF officer, and Mana nearly tripped on her own feet when she turned around, having come to a full stop far too quickly. "What? You could use a gunner in that thing, yeah?"

The idea of the redhead anywhere near the Raiden's weapon systems made her skin crawl. "No offense Asuka, but that little bonding moment upstairs? Not really enough to make it OK for you to be playing with the Raiden." Turning as Maya and the security team boarded the other tube, Kodama following after, she wasn't surprised when the redhead slid into her car's doors just as they were shutting.

"Shouldn't you be with your men, securing the facility?"

Asuka regarded the woman, her expression as unreadable as ever. "Now isn't the time to micromanage them. I've alerted the local military, but time-to-arrival isn't optimal." Her posture wilting slightly, the young woman leaned into the bar she held on to. "I gave the order to evacuate and lock down the facility." Shaking her head slowly, she loosed a sigh. "We aren't prepared to do war with soldiers."

Mana nodded, oddly surprised by the woman's attitude in this. She wasn't sending her own to die by the droves, beating themselves apart on that wall of firepower. Oddly the ideal of Asuka backing down so quickly, unnerved her. "But you're still having some go after Shinji?"

"Volunteers," the woman answered shortly, looking through the windows. The scene reminded her of a memory... or a phantom of one. A red sunset, three young people sitting in a railway car, and she was yelling at the one sitting -

Hanging on to the rails so as to not go careening into the walls, the redhead looked back at Mana steadily, as the auburn haired JSDF officer seemed to measure her, her blue eyes raking over her. Swallowing a chill, Asuka blinked, looking up and catching the other woman's eyes. "You know, I never got to say... well thanks."

Not what she'd expected to hear, Mana's brow shot up and she blinked, "Wh-what for?"

"Back in the invasion. When the white Evangelions came."

Wincing, Mana looked away. It wasn't one of her favorite memories.

She'd been mobilized in a patched together T-Raiden unit, and given the order to suppress any "heavy support" that Nerv mobilized. She knew that the order was mean to have her fighting an Evangelion, and for all practical purposes, she figured it'd be her last mission.

T-Raidens, though superior to any human mobile weaponry, and capable of either outmaneuvering or shooting down any heavy munitions used against them, were simply too awkward, slow and underpowered for use against something like an Eva. It wasn't as if she had a family to leave behind, or friends... she regretted that the time she'd gotten to spend with Shinji would essentially be undone with this, but at the same time... could it really be true?

Could Nerv be attempting their own cataclysm, under their very noses? The JSDF thought so, and so the order came. Her initial though was relief, when no Eva was present, and then... Asuka rose, like a damned Valkyrie out of the lake inside the GeoFront and hurled a battleship into the advancing JSDF forces.

"Asuka, stand down! Why are you helping them do this?" she'd ordered over the tac-net, only to have the bloody shadow of Unit-02 turn with a feral snarl her way and lunged nearly a kilometer, trying by sheer force and impact to tear her apart.

Mana quickly dodged, only gaining a moment's respite as the VTOLs that were her backup moved in and simply managed to piss off the Second Child more. A comms window snapped into her displays, showing the maddened, wide-eyed visage of Asuka, her breathing so rapid and deep that Mana imagined the plug suit was creaking under the strain. "You little whore, how dare you!"

And Mana knew then, that all the rumors were true. Asuka really did care for Shinji, and here she was, facing off against the Demon herself in a flimsy tin shell that couldn't even scratch the biomechanical monster that the vengeful spirit within was riding like a steed from hell. Without looking away from the T-Raiden, the Evangelion snatched a pair of VTOLs out of the air and hurled them at the mech, as Mana watched in horror.

"Asuka! There are people piloting those! People! Stand down!" Shifting quickly to an airborne mode, the older T-Raiden hovered just out of Asuka's reach.

Her laughter was punctuated by the screaming of ordinance that just didn't seem to enter the woman's notice. "You fucking bitch, I can't believe you'd show your face here!" Another airship was launched as a thrown stone, as Mana continued to pray, hope that the gambit would play out. Hovering, she'd engaged a targeting laser, and the countdown to a missile launch from a nearby mobile SATC-platform was moving far too slow for her tastes.

Communications went dead as the missile finally roared past her, it's bulk unreal as it crumpled against Unit-02's face and then the world was painted dirty orange and red from the hellstorm that erupted over the GeoFront's floor. Mana set the T-Raiden down, waiting for her scanners to adjust to the noise, when the demon leapt from the inferno, it's hand driving her mech into the ground savagely as it landed fist first against her armor.

"I won't forgive you!" The Evangelion reared back, arms straining as it roared to the sky, the sheer force of the thing's AT field blasting her mech away nearly a kilometer.

Systems were red all over the board. "God what a monster," she moaned, pushing the jets hard to get away from the enraged pilot. Her tac-net screeched and whined, and the orders were replaying slowly as she evaded another savage strike, when it's words finally sunk in.

"Evacuate! We have inbound hostile units, repeat, Evacuate!"

Swallowing, hoping to whatever god's watched over spies and soldiers, she roared the T-Raiden up over the Eva's reach, settling on the GeoFront's broken shell, where Tokyo-3 still burned. Looking down, she could see the mech's shadow playing over the destruction below, a blocky, ugly reminder that this was ultimately her sin to atone for, as well. "Please don't let them use dirty bombs... I can't stand the thought of us being responsible for that."

The reality was much worse. As she looked up, the white forms that were falling resolved themselves finally, as wings snapped free and they began circling like carrion crows. Her blood went cold as the tac-net went silent, the combine forces on both sides going still in the wake of those shadows.

"Sir, what are those," she'd asked, her mind still not wanting to process the idea of eight Evangelions or what they could do.

Her net sputtered from various interference, the electronic warfare making even their communication difficult, "Nerv branches around the world have been constructing Evas. The UN has no idea what or who these are, and I'm not going to have my men sit in the middle of a fight between those monsters. Get out, Kirishima. That's an order."

Mana had been a spy, a data collector and personality scanner for far too long to let that one slide. He knew what they were, what sent them. Sent them after Asuka. She keyed her comms to the Eva and forced the window active. "Asuka, you have to listen to me-"

"Shut up! Shutup _shutup_ _**SHUTUP**_!" her voice finally cracking, the redhead reached out and clawing a boulder from the GeoFront floor, hurling it at the T-Raiden, the impact destroying her makeshift perch. "Come down here and fight. Come down here and _die_!"

"Asuka! Look at those things!" her own temper growing hot, the JSDF pilot pulled her sensor feed into the main window. "Look at this! Don't throw your life away, why are you fighting for them? What is it Nerv is trying to do?"

A dark laughter was her answer, as Asuka's face was shrouded by her hair in the view. "Why are you fighting, traitor? My friends are here. My family," Mana's brows knit as Asuka reached out and seemed to caress the control module in the Eva's plug. "I don't care about Nerv! I won't let anything take them away." Her voice dropped an octave, and Mana was transfixed by the hate that radiated from the pilot's eyes, "I won't let you take him away!"

The first thing Mana thought was that the woman had gone mad, when she raked her hand across the video window, but when her Eva matched the motion and the first of the white Evangelions exploded in a burst of white light and blood, she quickly reassessed her opinion. "You're not the only one fighting for something Asuka."

"I don't need your words, traitor," the pilot hissed, barreling into the next Eva she could reach, destroying it's head with vicious double swing of her Unit's hands. "What would you do if it were Shinji here, hmm? I'm sure that'd please you, being able to stab him in the heart personally?" Another Eva fell, Asuka's fist slamming through it's chest impossibly, before goring it's companion just behind the thing. Giant muscles bulged and twisted, as the two impaled Evangelions shuddered and went silent.

Asuka's comment brought bile up in the spy's throat, and she let her attention falter, just long enough for one of those machines to cleave one of her mech's arms free. Scrambling to regain control of the T-Raiden's flight, she had to admit... if it were Shinji up here, what would that do the young man? Would he be fighting too?

What are they fighting for? She looked again to the sadistically grinning faces of the white Evas, featureless, distorted things. Mana could do nothing but hate them. Hate them for coming here, and for what they represented. Asuka wasn't her enemy, even is she defended those below, who's aims were unknown and unfathomable.

She couldn't let her die. Shinji would never forgive her.

Mana launched a volley of missiles, switching off her local tac-net. "No I wouldn't Asuka," her voice thick, the pilot rounded and fired another volley, making sure her point made it home. "But he'd tell me what Nerv was doing that has everyone thinking they're going to end the world." The barrage impacted three of the white things, as they turned their attention away from Asuka and onto her. "You may not think so, but we're on the same side here."

Picking up the dropped heavy sword one of the units had loosed from dead fingers, Asuka swung it in an arching sweep, digging a trench as tall as a building before effortlessly decapitating another Eva. "I. Don't. Need. You!"

Swallowing, Mana closed her eyes and pulled the jets to full, luring the things away as Asuka picked off another foe. "But we both... need him."

Her comm window snapped open, and Asuka's tear-filled eyes glared at her, teeth bloodying her lip. "Damn you. Damn you, Kirishima."

"You're welcome," the JSDF pilot replied softly, pulping the ground with gunfire before the Evas and sending up a storm of dust and debris, taking cover in the lake briefly to disorient the things. "Just let me help."

"Damn you."

I O I

Asuka watched as her words broke the woman before her, and sighed. When her eyes closed and her posture weakened, Asuka fought the inertia of the tube and pulled the woman down onto the ground, setting them both against the wall. "Mana. Mana..."

"Yeah..."

"Thanks," looking away, Asuka's gaze hardened , and she looked the other woman in the eye, her lips quirking just slightly. "You made a great decoy."

Shoving the other woman, Mana sniffed back her tears and took a few deep breaths. "Yeah, I guess so." She finally answered, her grin less sincere. "Will you tell me something, while we're sharing grossly inappropriate memories on our way to kill some fuckers who are threatening the one person we both value?" Nodding after a moment's thought, Asuka tucked her hands between her knees and watched as the tunnel walls sped by, the running lights out in the carved tube flashing by quickly. "Why didn't you tell him?"

"..."

Mana sighed, laying her head on her knees. "I knew. You know he knows, but you never said anything. You two..."

"We're...we're both too damaged." Her eyes distant and unseeing, Asuka shook a bit where she sat, looking again as old as Mana remembered, back in High School. Young and vulnerable. "There's so much hurt in us, that if one breaks, it could tear us both apart." Almost did so anyway, she admitted in a dark corner of herself. We almost destroyed each other just by _existing_ near one another. "He didn't need me."

She hated the voice in her, that kept this conversation going. What was she, masochistic? Or was it more some perverse knowledge that though these things hurt her in asking, it hurt Asuka more to answer. "Did you ever ask him? I know... back before things just... " she swallowed, trying to dodge that taboo topic. It was just something you didn't talk about. As if doing so would summon some very real memory of something horrible that couldn't be unseen. "You two. Everyone knows it was just you two."

"Are you jealous, Kirishima?" The words held no malice, and the both knew it was rhetoric. Mana knew where Shinji's heart was, but there would always be a part of his soul that only spoke Asuka's name, which she knew as well. "We were... he saw what happened to me," reaching up, she ran a hand over her brow, the faint scars there barely visible. "We were pilots. He wanted to save me, and he did. That's all it means," she lied, her tone saying clearly that was the end of this discussion.

The rest of the trip passed in silence, as the two sat, absorbed in their own thoughts. Finally, as the car pulled to a stop by the surface access areas, the women stood and Mana was unsurprised that Asuka stood fast and sure, as if their little moment had never happened. As the two walked silently to the dock, Mana reached down and pulled the USP from her hip, the noise making Asuka's back stiffen.

"Here," she said simply, as the redhead looked at her steadily. Nodding once, Asuka took the weapon and the offered clips. She was still sorting them into her pockets as they reached the dock, Mana walking ahead, snapping down her visor without looking back.

I O I

Scott was livid. Two absolutely inconsequential events of utter insignificance had upset the entire scenario, and jeopardized the plan in it's entirety. "Find them. Take a team up and if you have to, kill every person in this damned warren till you are sure they are dead," he snarled at the soldier, pushing his way between the men as he sought out the other source of his annoyance. "Where is Kessler?"

"He was heading to the convoy trucks, by last sighting."

Running a hand along his scalp, the man turned and pulled a soldier to him, gesturing along the walls of the dug out cavern they were currently holding from Nerv-3's internal security. "Get these charges functional and accepting commands. I don't know what it is that you've done wrong, but fix it! We're running out of time here." Maxwell had been very specific about this part, and for the plan to succeed, they needed Nerv-3 to be reduced to little more than a smoking crater, with both Directors inside.

Their quarrel was legend, and with the man conveniently dead in Asuka's facility, the same suffering from a structural fault and being razed from the inside out, little blame could be handed out elsewhere. It would be a monumental display of bad timing and ill luck that the dying man, come to his long time rival's side, would die by the same.

Evidence had been planted, implicating the woman, and even if discounted, the ruins and the nature of the explosives they were using would mask any trace of another party.

Security from Nerv was pinned down, unable to make headway, and unable to safely retreat. Most of their holds were easily defended, yet dangerous to abandon, which made it doubly easy for his troops to pin down and exterminate them. Unlike internal security, soldiers were trained to deal with such things. Grenades were nice, too.

The American was just checking his own weapon, the P90 slung over his shoulder, when the first blasts pulled his attention back to the front of the cavern. "No..."

Two of the main support charges, set to collapse the three upper floors in a cascade that would hollow out the facility, had blown. Debris was blown across the main area, and he could almost guarantee half his troops were under that fall. His eyes scanned the nearby supports, and widened as he saw the detonator triggers go from a safety locked red to a primed green.

The initial blast nearly took off his ear, as he dived for cover behind a series of bulkheads that had yet to be put in place. Nearby those, the research labs, skeletal but functional, erupted and the smoke blanketed the cavern quickly, whatever had been left inside belching acrid smoke into the limited air. Hand over his bleeding head and ear, the man managed to stumble back along the cavern, between explosions and flying shrapnel. "The hell is going on? Those things weren't suppose to detonate till we were clear!"

Headlights further down the tunnel got his attention, as one of the convoy trucks careened madly around, turning to face out of the tunnel. Breaking into a run, he shouldered the weapon and yelled, waving his arms. When the truck showed no sign of slowing, he dumped the last of his energy into a sprint, just managing to catch onto the carrier's back ledge. "Stop! God damn it stop!" Stone from the cavern floor caught and pulled at his leg as he tried to swing it up into the truck's bed, and he gritted his teeth as sometime snapped and pulled harshly. "Fuck!"

Finally Scott managed to roll into the cargo bed, narrowly avoiding landing on the exposed edges of prototype weapons and the crates that held other. After catching his breath, Scott tried reaching down to inspect his knee, and the damage that had been caused. His hands flew away from the joint as spikes of pain lanced into him. Shuffling on his back, he pulled up to the cab and pulled open the door leading from one section to another.

"Ah, see you made it, yes?" von Kessler regarded him grimly, guiding the convoy over the rocky path with some difficulty. The fat man looked back down the path, paying the pained man's pleas little heed as the truck bounced and skidded along the rock. "Mm, terrible business back there, just loaded the truck when things started going wrong, yes."

Scott gritted his teeth and hauled himself up, sitting against the doorway as his leg bent at an obscene angle. "Wh.. where were you going? What about my men?"

Von Kessler spared him a look, brows raised as he guided the truck further along the darkened tunnel. "Oh? Would you like to go back for them?"

"Tch..." looking away, the American tried instead to bite back the lances of pain that shot through him each time the truck hit a bit of debris, or some irregularity in the path. "Convenient..."

Watching Scott from the corner of his eye, Maxwell waited for a sizable ridge in the path, to press the small plastic detonator back into his pocket. "Life is made of such things, Mr. Scott, mm? Yes, luck and timing. Everything about life, luck and timing." Humming a passage from an old classical piece, the man smiled as Scott writhed, trying not to pass out from the pain of his broken limb.

I O I

"Not good, not good not good... " Maya's mantra was beginning to etch it's way into Kodama's already frayed mind. She's expected to fall into some damned crevasse with how things were exploding below them, but so far the structure had held... again she looked to her patients. Shinji was barely alive, looking like he'd been through hell itself. Beside him, snoring slightly with her brow drawn, her sister slept.

She'd nearly lost her sense when she saw the state of the younger woman's clothes, but that had turned grim when she'd realized the blood to all be Shinji's. "What are you babbling about, Maya?"

Glaring over her terminal, the tech heaved a sigh, "I don't babble. I mutter, and I'm muttering about the structure. We've lost the main supports and with the way this place has been hollowed out... I think we may have a few minutes, at best, before the shifting of the floors breaches the reactor."

Kodama's eyes widened, as she considered the implications. Nerv-3 it seemed used an old nuclear plant to power the facility, and with the entire structure falling in on it... "We need to get out of here."

"There may be a problem with that," the man beside her announced. "The Director issued an evacuation order, and to control any further casualties, the facility is locked down to outside access." At the woman's look of incredulity, he shook his head. "We have the heliport. It's just a few minutes longer."

Maya planned the route and shook her head. "We... may not make it." As the walls flitted with images of bare rock, the passengers looked to their unconscious companions, the irony of finding them only to have the very weight of the whole of Nerv-3 crush them not lost. Keying in a comm window on her terminal, the tech hoped Mana would see reason, in the face of what she'd be asking her.

I O I

"This thing is pretty interesting," Asuka commented, until she saw the cockpit of the Raiden open. "And... cramped."

Shaking her head, Mana dropped the greatcoat into one of the small hatches lining the things control center, and inspected the pilot's couch. "It's not a passenger vehicle... this is going to be awkward."

Mana's alien appearance in her flight suit didn't help the illusion that woman was sizing her up. Asuka swallowed, before looking back to the tangle of cording and synthetic muscle that unwove to reveal the thing's control center. "How do you pilot it?"

The auburn haired woman paused, as she inspected the couch and looked back over her shoulder. "Transductive nervous transfer." Turning to shove some of the machine's muscle aside, the Eva pilot was surprised to see the material giving way and retreating before Mana's gestures. When the spy looked back at the other woman's uncomprehending expression, she sighed and pointed to her back, as she knelt down to adjust some more fittings. "I have needles in my spine that tell it how to go."

"I'm not an idiot," Asuka snapped, but realized she didn't have the technical knowledge of the machine Mana did. Her research went along different lines. "And fucking ow, yeah. Doesn't that... well hurt? Or paralyze you?"

Shrugging, Mana reached back and tapped the spinal interface plate with a fingertip. "I've been doing this since I was ten. The needle fibers degrade into saline if left uncharged too long, and the actual damage is healed by time and a special cocktail of localized nanomachines, thanks to Nerv Medical."

Nodding, Asuka halted a moment, looking back to the woman with wide eyes. "Nerv... Medical? That only became a real company four years ago."

"Makes you appreciate LCL a lot more, doesn't it?" Mana's smirk wasn't pleasant, as she reached down, offering the blinking redhead her hand. "Come on, and I hope you don't have personal space issues."

If her hand wasn't already clasped and her weight being helped up into the oddly organic looking bay, Asuka would have let go and wondered what the woman meant. On closer inspection of the couch, Asuka wished she'd just went with the others. "Are you sure I won't fit in one of those compartments?"

"Not in one piece."

Sighing, Asuka watched as Mana settled herself into the high G couch but didn't close the supporting structure that held her onto it. "So, um. Where do I sit?"

Smirking, the woman patted a thigh. "I think the more appropriate word would be 'spoon'".

"Oh you have got to be shitting me," she huffed, throwing up her hands and climbing in. They spent a few moments getting as comfortable as possible, Asuka ending up straddling the woman's thigh and curled around her side. Asuka's blush nearly matched her hair as the woman closed her eyes and gritted her teeth. "Never. Speak. Of. This." She sighed, but realized quickly the movement only increased their already excessive body contact. "Ever," she hissed, making sure the point was driven home.

Mana was glad of the visor and her covered eyes, as the Raiden lifted off and sped toward the false wall that they'd found earlier. Almost at the crest of the tree line, Maya's face snapped into her vision, an urgent call window framing it. "Mana! You have to come back!"

"What? We just got around the mountainside, we're almost to the tunnel!"

Maya shook her head hard, "No, you have to! Explosives have knocked out the main supports. The reactor is going to go critical any minute."

"Let me guess, you're not close enough to the heliport?" Maya shook her head. Damn it. Tensing, the pilot swung the machine around and gunned the repulsors, swearing at each passing moment. "Set up a homing beacon. I'll cut my way in and everyone can load up in the med-bay."

"We're in the tram, you'll have to chase down the car," the woman said, adding one more problem to the day. Growling, Mana felt Asuka's nails biting into her stomach and turned to glare at the woman. "What?"

"Untense. Your. Thigh."

Blinking a moment, suddenly she realized why the woman would be so annoyed at such a thing. Blushing heavily, her only response was a muffled, "Oh."

"Mana? Is Asuka in there-"

"No!" the two women yelled at once, the comm window snapping shut with Maya's wide-eyed expression.

Directing the mech to home in on the escaping tram car, Mana deployed the Raiden's main weapon, hoping it would be sufficient to cut a path into the transport system. It wouldn't have full power while the Raiden was in flight, but with any luck... "Hang on, this is going to get unpleasant."

"It not like I can hold on any tighter," the former pilot groused, then discovered she was wrong, as a dizzying set of high-G maneuvers set her head spinning. And then the world shuddered and screamed, and her vision went white.

"Asuka. Hey, Asuka...?"

"Mm?" Groaning, she blinked and realized how tight she was clinging to the other pilot. "Sorry... what happened?" Trying to relax her grip, the former pilot was jostled hard again.

"Forgot the Banshee has a heavy audio component, which my helmet dampens. I don't even have earplugs." Mana just shook her head. "Should have warned you." She should have warned the young woman that they were flying down a tunnel barely big enough to hold them as well.

The tram lines were cut out of the bedrock Nerv-3 was settled into, or formed concrete passages where they ran through the facility. Planning had used the system of them as an auxiliary support structure, so they ran trough most of Nerv-3. Raiden's main repulsor array, usually swung out on it's armatures like an insects forewing shell, were currently swept back along the mech's back and only ten percent of the thrust available was being used. That coupled with the tram's velocity on it's own didn't work in their favor, but there was one more problem that Mana was fighting with that complicated things.

She wasn't able to bring Maya's external bay with them, so she had to grab the tram and drag it out directly. Because the Raiden didn't have articulate arms, she had to position a leg forward, which meant the mech was flying in probably the most awkward pose she'd ever imagined. "This... is going to suck. Maya!"

"What is it?" The tech's face snapped into her vision, the comm window pulled into her vision and set to transparent. "How close are you, we're running out of time," her anxiety was apparent, and through the window Mana watched the tram shake violently. She winced, realizing that she couldn't feel the tremors that were likely rattling the facility as it shifted into the earth.

Pouring as much speed as she could into the chase, Mana swallowed, wetting her lips, "Maya, listen close. Button everything you can down. I'm going to grab the tram. Brace everyone on the leading side, and get ready for a rough go."

Looking behind her a moment, the tech regarded her anxiously, "Alright. Just be as easy as you can. We have wounded." When the feed cut out, Mana set the Raiden's systems to analyze the car's speed and how to best... pluck it.

"Everyone to the front and brace! Mana's going to have to haul us out manually," helping Kodama with the wounded, the young woman saw the security force conversing and setting themselves up against the wall, backs to the tram's shell and arms out wide. "What are you doing?"

"The Director gave us orders to protect and assist in any way to assure the safety of your team and Director Ikari," gesturing to the others, he nodded back to the woman. "We don't have time to rip out the seat cushions. We'll do in their stead."

Closing her eyes, Maya just nodded once and did her best to settle Shinji and the still unconscious Hikari in a way so that the men would function as a brace, hoping they all made it out of this in one piece. "Ready?"

Kodama nodded, as the security team did the same, strapping in with belts and what they could find to help keep the shifting to a minimum. She looked once more to the still forms of Hikari and Shinji and closed her eyes again, "Go, Mana."

And then the world exploded into noise and everything went sideways. Rapid deceleration threw them all against that wall, and her breath exploded from her in a burst as she slammed into a wall of black suit that grunted at the impact. Suddenly, their idea to act as a human cushion didn't seem so silly. Looking to the other side of the car, her eyes widened as the Raiden's clawed foot was hooked into and crumpling the rear of the thing. Again, the world went wrong as the sound of twisting metal and rock rending tore into the car, and it jerked to a stop, before another rising scream forced her to close her eyes, the noise too much to bear.

Mana lifted the tram car as easily as she could, biting her lip as the thing rattled and shifted below her. Almost all the glass was broken or blown free from the Banshee's second blast, to break them free of the system tube. As the Raiden lifted free, she pulled the gunship into a hover and sighed in relief, glad to have managed the rescue without accidentally killing everyone inside. "Stabilize and analyze the car, maximize maneuvers for it's integrity," mentally keying in the commands, she cast about and located the medical bay, grimacing as she saw the rooftop nearest it simply fall in. "Maya, hold on."

Not expecting an answer, she let the machine hover to the bay, hoping to arrive before it too sank into the earth. "Asuka, how are you doing?"

The former pilot tried to shake the ringing from her ears, and heaved a sigh, "I'm OK. Are they?"

"Thinking so, but won't know till we get away from here and get them into the bay," Stresses were causing the thing to begin shearing, and she bit her lip. "Got to get out of here. Is there a safe-zone that we can land? Anything that won't explode, melt or cave in under us?"

"That's not fair and you know it," she bit out, her vision full of auburn hair and Mana's neck. "How soon till we get there."

"Soon. Uncomfortable?"

"I hate your shampoo."

Chuckling, Mana managed a minute shrug, "Shinji likes it- ow! My ear, you little-!"

"Shut up and drive," smirking the former pilot found herself immensely more comfortable. "There's an airport three klicks west, just transmit this code..."

I O I

"Hey, earth to Baka, you hit your head harder than it looked?"

Shinji looked up, into the blue eyes of his former roommate. "No, no I'm fine. Just remembering the last few..." laughing quietly, he shook his head. "Months? Feels like it."

A noise to their right preceded Kodama coming into the room, from the observation area, "Still not steady on your feet? How's your hip?" Sitting a small bag beside the man where he lay, Kodama took out a small device and ran it over the device in his chest. "Hmm. Everything seems OK."

"Yeah, I'm fine, just had a moment where I got distracted," smirking up at the two women hovering over him, he chuckled. "Could be these two lovely ladies that keep watching me while I totter about in a pair of shorts and little else." As expected, Kodama simply grinned, her skin flushing just slightly while Asuka sputtered and jumped up, glaring at him. "But seriously, I'm just not used to feeling so... sluggish."

Kodama nodded, helping him back up and braced against the railings. "You were in a bottle of goo for a month, after getting blown up, I'm sure that being a bit unstable is allowed now and then." Patting him on the shoulder, she stepped back and tried to ignore the anxiety in his face, as he looked down habitually at the glowing module now resident in his chest.

"Yeah." Shaking off his mental fugue, Shinji's brows knit as he forced his feet to obey, his body sluggishly following. "It's not that I'm weak. My body is as strong as ever, it's more like there's a... layer of cotton muffling what I'm saying, to what it's hearing."

"It'll pass. In the mean time, how have you been feeling? Any symptoms that we mentioned?"

He considered the question a moment, and shook his head. "No sickness, no appetite issues, no..." Sighing, he pointedly didn't look at Asuka, "no dysfunctions in other areas."

Smirking, Kodama nodded. "So I've heard."

"Anyway," leaning heavily against a rail after the small trek from one side to the other, he frowned, mind on other matters. "Where's Mana and the others? I want to go over the new data on that UN issue."

Asuka helped him to the wheelchair, as he caught his breath. "She'll be along in a half an hour, so you have time to get on a suit. She's still sorting out the details of a personal project from what I hear." Though relations between the two had gotten better, amazingly so to Shinji's mind, it was still a strained thing at times. Usually this became more apparent when he was in the room, which pained him, but couldn't be helped. "We had a new breakthrough, but we still need to keep you as low profile as possible."

That was likely the understatement of the year. His staff had decided, through much argument, to release to the press that he'd been injured heavily, and was currently not in a state to see the public. Repercussions were immediate, with the UN reliably asking for a cessation of command of Nerv to itself, which was unanimously refused, after evidence of the attack on Nerv-3 was made public.

Since then, it had been a month of ongoing legal and political battles, and without much effort, a world court decided that with the available evidence and what had been found by private investigation and orders on the release of data, that the UN's vestment in Nerv and the actions leading to Shinji's near-assassination were a conflict of interest. Until such a time as Shinji could appear before the UN himself, no more claims or actions against his leadership would be made.

That of course, didn't keep them from choking funds and limiting their own resources, as a sign of the stressed relations.

Shinji for his part, initially had difficulty believing the UN capable of such a thing, .When faced with the fact some faction within it had plotted to kill him, and not only him but an entire facility to cover themselves, and blame it on Asuka, he'd stopped questioning. "Good. How about that other project?"

Looking at him askance, she tried to hide a smirk, "Surprised you're so interested in that considering."

"Just because you got to pick the colors, doesn't mean I don't like them," he replied, peering back and up at her. "Besides, I'm just glad Maya didn't get the chance to do it her way."

Snorting, Asuka laughed as she wheeled her boss down the halls of the lowest levels of Nerv. "Yeah. I'm sure you've had enough of wearing purple and green. And what was with that horn anyway?"

"Symbolic, really," he quipped, earning him a smack. "OK, ow."

"Baka," she muttered, sounding thoughtful. "Why didn't you complain about the colors?"

Smiling to himself, Shinji just looked down the hall and remembered seeing her, standing beside Mana as he woke up the first time out of the LCL that had stabilized him. The sun behind them had lightened and colored their hair into halos, red and gold. The shock of seeing them both, and not at each other's throats had almost convinced him that he was dreaming again. Truth was stranger, as always he'd learned. Shinji would let Asuka believe it was all her, and her arguing to have the project colored in the same tones as her Evangelion, but he and Maya knew the truth. "Doesn't this thing go any faster? Or are you wearing heels again?"

A small huff behind him was his only warning before the front wheels popped up off the ground, and the two of them tore down the halls at a sprint.

I O I

The same darkened room was host again, to those who had met months ago, for the purpose of saving the life of the very man this time in attendance. Lights, bright and focused picked out those present, one of whom looking about with a scowl. "What's with this stupid lighting?"

"Sorry," the lights came up, and Shinji snickered, realizing the meeting room was just corner of the labs, cordoned off with file cabinets and lit by skeletal lighting hung out over the warehouse like setting. Maya blinked, her hand on the lighting control as her eyes adjusted. "We usually kept them low, so we didn't get too much attention from passing techs and researchers."

Chuckling, Shinji shook his head as the woman took her seat, looking more at ease in the stronger light. Before them on the table, spread out all the information they'd collected, as well as some other files of interest for the day. "So, how goes our own investigation?"

The meeting began with those words, as heads of Nerv from across the globe bandied about information, data and finds from within their own facilities. More moles and subversives had been found and the data submitted to the world court overseeing the UN vs. Nerv hearings. Numbers of those were stunning, to the young man who thought with the end of the Angel Wars, people could start to live their lives in peace, working for a single goal.

If anything, the power vacuums left after Second Impact were magnets for the kind of thought that lead to even further subversive tactics. "Three more of those underground labs. Right under us. All abandoned you say?"

One of his counterparts nodded, displaying the relevant data on the holographic screen. "As well as two more in the works, found abandoned," as the data proceeded to tell them an approximate level of material and what had been made, and the mood darkened visibly.

"That's enough firepower and weapons to occupy most of Europe. How did this slip through?" No one had an answer, but he knew. The UN, part of it wasn't happy with just being a body of governors, officials in a system that had no power to rule, but the responsibility to protect.

Too long in that role, and it seemed some felt entitled to the crown of those they protected as well. "Any idea on a staging area? You can't just hide this much armament in the open."

Maya stood and keyed in a series of commands, "Mana's access to the JSDF and our close association have let us use their satellite system. We think they're dumping most of the weapons into PMC groups, using previous military systems under dummy administrations as warehousing, and networking it all via some of the NP technology I'm not sure of."

This got his attention. "NP tech? They're using medical nanomachines?"

"You have to remember, Shinji, these things are just like... worker ants." Rubbing at her temple, woman sighed. "You can program them to fix the body – or destroy it. Or simply change certain things within limits of the body's capability. PMC troops, given the option to be more efficient, more powerful as payment for laundering weapons, well... it's an easy equation."

"So," his mind whirring with the possibilities, probabilities, Shinji leaned forward, standing uneasily despite his caretaker's protests. Others at the table muttered amongst themselves, and through it all he could sense a thread of worry. Guilt. Anger. It built up in him, seeing these people, all of his own choosing, all like-minded. People who wanted to save others, help those that couldn't help themselves. Some were career scientists, some were recycled war technicians. All were his, and loyal to him. And now, they were all targets. "Quiet!" Silence fell as his voice's echo died off. "I've lived my life here, in Tokyo-3... since I came here I was fighting for people. To _save_ people.

"I'm not brave and I'm not powerful. At the time, I wasn't even willing," shaking his head, the young man remembered the Angel Wars, his own broken soul and let that wash over him, the memory of who he was, tempering who he had to become. "But I never, _ever_ wanted what I did to hurt anyone. Anyone here that thinks that Nerv is about that, can leave. Now." When no one stood to go, he nodded, a ghost of a smile on his face. "We unwittingly built the foundation for a system that has used us, to arm a group of terrorists masquerading under the banner of peace. We have our evidence, and in a month, I imagine the UN's hold on us will be gone. When that happens, you can expect one of two things."

Holding up a hand, he pointed to that rotating globe, "Those that have our weapons, and make no mistake, they are ours, will strike at the UN with our banner and cause us to be the devil in the world's eyes." Forcing himself to stand without support, he swept his eyes over the table, unhappy with his vision of the future, but prepared for it. "The other option is that they'll strike at us, directly, and use our unarmed status to take our branches. Once that happens, with the UN's controls gone, they can openly mass produce what they've been building in secret."

Slamming his fist into the table, the young man glared up at that globe, it's form reflecting cold and empty in his eyes. "I refuse them both options."

"What can we do?"

Maya stood, and turning to the data, pulled up another file, sitting to the side. "We can fight back." Schematics poured out, and the collected leaned forward, scientists and planners all, interested in what the answer would be. "This is the Mark I, Code named "Iron Man". Small, versatile. Capable of intercontinental flight and engagement. We've made it as prepared as possible to the ends of countering our own technology, but the production is limited. So is it's source of power." The diagram focused then on the unit at it's heart, the same that kept Shinji's own beating.

"You mean to say that-"

"I will pilot it." The sentence, said once before, made him smile. Shinji remembered then Rei's crimson eyes looking up at him. Remembered Misato, pushing him into an elevator. Remembered Asuka and Mana saving him and Hikari, whom had kept him alive. Gesturing to the side, he heard the small reply from Mana, and her team of troops moved forward, taking their place to the side. A familiar, older face in it's midst caused him to chuckle a moment, as the men's eyes met. Turning back to the display, he zoomed it out as the suit took form, red and gold and deadly. "It's my company. It's my responsibility. It is who I am.

"I will be the Iron Man."

-10-30-08 6pm est. Edits that didn't get uploaded.

* * *

A/N: Alright. If you're complaining about how long it took to get from word 1 to the suit, let me make this clear: I prefer plot to pointless flashy action. If I didn't develop a world that the story could be believable in, then this would just be a bunch of mismatched ideas, pointless posing and bad characterization. I thought about it, and there's no easy way to get Shinji into the Iron Man persona, without three things happening. 1) Injure him (Check). 2) Build a world where such a thing is plausible. Evaverse is not it, on it's own. It needed time, and effort. So, we fast forward a bit past 3I, and give Nerv a believable spin. (Check). 3) Give Shinji a reason, to be Iron Man. Hints at the Armor Wars plot, a dash of MGS, and some personal attacks and threats on the ideals he's established as his own reason to be, and there we go. Think it could be simpler. Go write it. I'll probably read it.

I don't write simple stories. Nor do I write fast, pointless action. Iron Man is as much "the man in the suit" as it is the suit itself. If the balance of shots between Tony and Iron Man in the movie weren't enough to prove that, read the comic sometime. His villain gallery sucks. Most of his enemies, are either his own demons, his own construction, or himself literally. Enough bitching. Justifying plot always makes me irritable.

--

Spotlight time for Asuka, because she deserved it in EoE, and a demonstration of how Mana got whooped then as well. That was Asuka's show, and as neat as the Raidens are - an Eva will still stomp them.

You'll be happy to know - History and setup for the story is done.

And yes, Shinji's mad. You'll get to see the significance of the new people next chapter. I didn't want this one to hit 20K words. Yep, More MGS4 references to be made soon, as I think that fits well with the technology and ideology of the people on this stage. Nothing like a crossover though. Logical progression only. PM me what you think Shinji should name his 'group'. I'm currently debating amalgams ranging from MGS PMC names to Marvelverse organizations to random junk that sounds cool. Current on the lists is "Heaven's Shield", a nod to SHIELD (which likely won't be around here) and Outer Heaven (MGS fame), as well as picking a little bit at the Nerv logo itself.


End file.
